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THE    EDUCATION     OF    THE 
AMERICAN    CITIZEN 


THE  EDUCATION 
THE  AMERICAN  CtTffi&N 


BY 

ARTHUR   TWINING   HADLEY 

President  of  Yale  University 

AUTHOR   OF   "economics:    AN   ACCOUNT  OF  THE   RELATIONS   BETWEEN 

PRIVATE  PROPERTY   AND  PUBLIC   WELFARE,"    "  RAILROAD 

TRANSPORTATION:   ITS  HISTORY  AND  ITS  LAWS" 


NEW    YORK 

CHARLES    SCRIBNER'S   SONS 

1901 


H3h' 


f  »  *  f  J*  •   • 


Copyright,  1901, 
By  Yale   University 

Published,  September,  tqoi 


UNIVERSITY  PRESS    •    JOHN  WILSON 
AND   SON    •    CAMBRIDGE,  U.S.  A. 


PEEFACE 

In  many  of  the  political  writings  of  the  day,  there  is 
a  tendency  to  lay  too  much  stress  on  the  mechanism  of 
government  and  of  industry,  and  too  little  stress  on  the 
force  by  which  this  mechanism  is  kept  at  work.  In 
recent  educational  movements,  also,  too  much  thought 
is  perhaps  given  to  the  problem  of  preparing  men  and 
women  to  take  their  several  places  in  a  social  machine, 
and  too  little  to  the  development  of  that  power  and  spirit 
upon  which  the  perpetuation  of  our  whole  social  order 
depends. 

From  my  public  addresses  and  magazine  articles  of 
the  past  few  years,  I  have  tried  to  select  those  which 
emphasize  the  more  neglected  side  of  these  questions,  and 
to  arrange  them  in  a  continuous  series.  In  a  book  thus 
prepared,  it  is  inevitable  that  there  should  be  some  repe- 
tition and  some  apparent  inconsistencies.  If  the  reader 
is  perplexed  by  any  of  these  things,  he  will  perhaps  find 
the  explanation  in  the  date  of  the  different  utterances 
and  the  special  conditions  under  which  they  were  made 
public. 

No  sharp  line  can  be  drawn  between  those  papers 
which  are  political  and  those  which  are  educational.  It 
is  becoming   evident  that  the  really   difi&cult   political 

vii 


PREFACE 

problems  of  the  day  can  be  solved  only  by  an  educational 
process.  Not  by  the  axioms  of  metaphysics  on  the  one 
hand,  nor  by  the  machinery  of  legislation  on  the  other, 
can  we  deal  with  the  questions  which  vex  human  society. 
We  must  rely  on  personal  character;  and  as  new  diffi- 
culties arise,  we  must  develop  our  standard  of  character 
to  meet  them.  It  is  also  becoming  evident  that  the  real 
test  of  an  educational  system  lies  in  its  training  of  the 
citizen  to  meet  political  exigencies.  If  it  accomplishes 
this  result,  it  is  fundamentally  good,  whatever  else  it 
may  leave  imdone;  if  it  fails  at  this  cardinal  point,  no 
amount  of  excellence  in  other  directions  can  save  it  from 
condemnation. 

This  book  is  offered  to  the  public  in  the  hope  that  it 
may  contribute  something  to  the  understanding  of  our 
political  needs,  to  the  growth  of  a  public  sentiment 
which  shall  give  us  power  to  meet  those  needs,  and  to 
the  development  of  those  educational  methods  which 
shall  make  for  an  increase  of  such  power  in  the  years 
which  are  to  come. 

Tale  University,  New  Haven, 
April,  1901. 


VIU 


CONTENTS 


Page 
THE  DEMANDS  OF  THE  TWENTIETH  CENTURY  .        1 
An  Address  delivered  before  The  New  England  Soci- 
ety of  New  York  City,  December  22,  1900. 

OUR  STANDARDS  OF  POLITICAL  MORALITY     .     .        6 
An   Address  delivered  before  the  Convocation  of  the 
University  of  Chicago,  January  2,  1900. 

GOVERNMENT  BY  PUBLIC  OPINION 17 

An  Address   delivered  at  the  Charter  Day  Exercises 
of  the  University  of  California,  March  23,  1901. 

THE  FORMATION  AND  CONTROL  OF  TRUSTS  .     .      34 

Scribner's  Magazine,  November,  1899. 

SOCIALISM  AND  SOCIAL  REFORM 61 

Forum,  October,  1894. 

THE  RELATION  BETWEEN  ECONOMICS  AND  POLI- 
TICS   64 

Opening  Address  at  the  meeting  of  the  American  Eco- 
nomic Association,  New  Haven,  December  27,  1898. 

ECONOMIC  THEORY  AND  POLITICAL  MORALITY      88 

Opening  Address  at  the  meeting  of  the  American  Eco- 
nomic Association,  Ithaca,  December  27,  1899. 

ETHICS  AS  A  POLITICAL  SCIENCE 100 

Yale  Review,  November,  1892 ;  February,  1893. 
ix 


CONTENTS 

Paob 
POLITICAL  EDUCATION 135 

An  Address  delivered  at  the  celebration  of  Founders' 
Day,  Vassar  College,  April  27,  1900. 

THE  RELATION  BETWEEN  HIGHER  EDUCATION 

AND  THE  PUBLIC  WELFARE 160 

An  Address  delivered  before  the  Connecticut  State 
Board  of  Agriculture,  December  11,  1900. 

THE     DIRECTION     OF    AMERICAN     UNIVERSITY 
DEVELOPMENT 161 

An  Address  delivered  at  the  Twenty-fifth  Anniversary 
of  the  Founding  of  Vanderbilt  University,  October 
23,  1900. 

FUNDAMENTAL  REQUIREMENTS  IN  SCHOOL  EDU- 
CATION      175 

An  Address  delivered  before  a  meeting  of  teachers  at 
Norfolk,  Connecticut,  November  20,  1900. 

THE  USE  AND  CONTROL  OF  EXAMINATIONS    .     .     191 
A  Paper  read  before  the   Department  of  Superinten- 
dence, National  Educational  Association,  February 
26,  1901. 

YALE  PROBLEMS,  PAST  AND  PRESENT      ....     210 
Inaugural    Address  as    President   of  Yale  University, 
October  18,  1899. 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN 
CITIZEN 


THE  DEMANDS  OF  THE  TWENTIETH 
CENTURY 

It  sometimes  happens  that  the  meaning  of  a  great 
anniversary  is  for  a  time  partly  lost;  and  then  found 
once  more,  when  some  renewal  of  the  old  conditions 
arises,  and  it  becomes  an  inspiration  for  the  present 
as  well  as  a  remembrance  of  the  past.  Such  was  the 
fate  of  the  birthday  of  our  national  independence. 
During  the  first  half  of  the  nineteenth  century  the 
celebration  of  the  Fourth  of  July  grew  more  and 
more  perfunctory.  To  those  who  knew  not  what  it 
meant  to  fight  for  an  idea,  the  memory  of  Revolu- 
tionary heroes  became  obscured;  their  principles  be- 
came mere  phrases,  from  which  the  vital  substance 
had  gone  out.  But  under  the  stress  of  another  great 
war,  with  the  new  emotions  which  it  excited,  this  an- 
niversary at  once  rose  into  something  more  than  an 
empty  form  of  commemoration  of  the  dead,  and  made 
itself  an  occasion  of  patriotism  in  the  living. 

So  it  has  been,  to  some  extent,  with  Forefathers' 
Day,  and  the  annual  celebrations  which  attend  it.  There 
has  been  at  times  a  somewhat  perfunctory  character  in 
our  remembrance  of  the  Puritan,  both  of  the  old  England 
and  of  the  new.  Although  we  have  not  ceased  to  render 
him  gratitude  for  the  hardships  which  he  bore  in  order 
that  his  descendants  might  live  a  hfe  of  freedom,  we 
have  in  some  measure  lost  personal  contact  with  the 
I  1 


'THE '^U'CATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

**  *  ihW  Und'  iiridferstanding  of  what  he  really  was.  By 
nine  persons  out  of  ten,  the  Puritans  of  the  seven- 
teenth century  are  remembered  chiefly  for  the  pattern 
of  their  clothes  or  the  phraseology  of  their  creeds; 
and  even  the  tenth  man  who  really  goes  below  the 
surface  often  lays  wrong  emphasis  on  the  different  parts 
of  their  activity,  and  fails  to  understand  the  tru6  reason 
of  their  power.  He  thinks  of  the  Puritan  not  so  much 
for  what  he  did  as  for  what  he  refused  to  do  and  forbade 
others  to  do;  as  one  who  held  himself  aloof  from  the 
joys  of  life  and  apart  from  the  sympathies  of  humanity. 

Not  in  such  restrictions  and  refusals  was  the  strength 
of  the  Puritan  character  founded.  Not  by  any  such 
negative  virtue  did  he  conquer  the  world.  The  true 
Puritan  was  intensely  human  —  a  man  who  "  ate  when 
he  was  hungry,  and  drank  when  he  was  thirsty ;  loved 
his  friends  and  hated  his  enemies."  If  he  submitted  to 
self-imposed  hardships,  and  practised  abstention  where 
others  allowed  themselves  latitude,  it  was  not  because 
he  had  less  range  of  interest  than  his  fellows,  but  be- 
cause he  had  more  range.  He  did  these  things  as  a 
means  to  an  end.  His  thoughts  went  beyond  the  limits 
of  the  single  day  or  the  single  island.  He  was  a  man 
who  considered  power  as  more  than  possession,  princi- 
ples as  better  than  acquirements,  pubhc  duty  as  para^ 
mount  to  personal  allegiance.  He  regarded  himself  as 
part  of  a  universe  under  God's  government.  For  the 
joy  of  taking  his  place  in  that  government  he  steeled 
himself  to  a  temper  which  spared  not  his  own  body  nor 
that  of  others.  His  life,  with  all  its  powers,  was  held  in 
trust.  To  the  fulfilment  of  this  trust  he  subordinated 
all  considerations  of  personal  pleasure. 

Men  are  always  divided  more  or  less  clearly  into  two 
types,  —  those  who  recognize  this  character  of  life  as  a 

2 


THE  DEMANDS   OF  THE   TWENTIETH  CENTURY 

trust,  and  those  who  fail  to  recognize  it.  But  not  in  all 
ages  and  in  all  countries  does  the  distinction  between 
the  two  types  manifest  itself  sharply  in  historic  action. 
Often  the  range  of  possible  interests  is  so  small,  and  the 
conduct  of  life  so  bound  down  by  conventions,  that  the 
man  who  would  pursue  pleasure  finds  no  opportunity  for 
adventure,  nor  does  the  man  who  is  ready  to  accept  large 
trusts  find  occasion  for  their  exercise.  But  in  England, 
at  the  beginning  of  the  seventeenth  century,  the  dis- 
covery of  new  worlds  abroad  and  the  development  of 
new  problems  at  home  gave  opportunity  for  this  diver- 
gence of  character  to  show  itself  to  the  utmost.  The 
explorer  who  journeyed  for  adventure  or  for  gain  was 
differentiated  from  him  who  journeyed  for  freedom's 
sake.  The  citizen  who  was  ready  to  seek  his  fullest  en- 
joyment in  the  old  pohtical  order  was  separated  from 
him  who  would  hazard  that  enjoyment  for  what  he  be- 
lieved to  be  eternal  principles  of  human  government.  It 
was  because  England  had  men  of  the  latter  type  that  her 
subsequent  progress  as  a  free  nation  has  been  realized. 
It  was  the  Puritan  who,  by  subjecting  his  power  and 
his  love  of  Ufe  to  self-imposed  restraints,  made  freedom 
possible  in  two  hemispheres. 

Once  more  we  are  come  to  a  similar  parting  of  the 
ways.  The  close  of  the  nineteenth  century  has  wit- 
nessed an  expansion  of  the  geographical  boundaries  of 
men's  interests  comparable  only  to  that  which  came  three 
hundred  years  earlier,  in  the  days  of  Queen  Elizabeth. 
It  is  for  the  next  generation  to  decide  how  these  new 
fields  shaU  be  occupied.  Shall  it  be  to  gratify  ambition, 
commercial  and  political?  or  shall  it  be  to  exercise  a 
trust  which  has  been  given  us  for  the  advancement  of 
the  human  race  ?  Shall  we  enter  upon  our  new  posses- 
sions in  the  spirit  of  the  adventurer,  or  in  the  spirit  of 

3 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

the  Puritan  ?  The  conflict  between  these  two  views  will 
be  the  really  important  issue  in  the  complex  maze  of 
international  relations  during  the  half-century  which  is 
to  come.  The  outcome  of  this  conflict  is  likely  to 
determine  the  course  of  the  world's  history  for  ages 
thereafter. 

Nor  is  it  in  international  politics  and  in  problems  of 
colonization  alone  that  this  issue  is  arising  between  those 
who  regard  the  world  as  a  field  for  pleasure  and  those 
who  regard  it  as  a  place  for  the  exercise  of  a  trust.  The 
development  of  modem  industry  has  placed  the  alter- 
native even  more  sharply  before  us  in  the  ordering  of 
our  life  at  home.  The  day  is  past  when  the  automatic 
action  of  self-interest  could  be  trusted  to  regulate  prices, 
or  when  a  few  simple  principles  of  commercial  law,  if 
properly  applied,  secured  the  exercise  of  justice  in  matters 
of  trade.  The  growth  of  large  industries  and  of  large 
fortunes  enables  those  who  use  them  rightly  to  do  the 
public  much  better  service  than  was  possible  in  ages 
previous.  It  also  permits  those  who  use  them  wrongly 
to  render  the  public  correspondingly  greater  injury.  No 
system  of  legislation  is  likely  to  meet  this  difficulty. 
The  outcome  depends  on  the  character  of  the  people.  Is 
our  business  to  be  dominated  by  the  spirit  of  the  adven- 
turer, or  by  the  spirit  of  the  Puritan  ?  Shall  we  regard 
wealth  as  a  means  of  enjoyment  and  commercial  power 
as  a  plaything  to  be  used  in  the  game  of  personal 
ambition?  or  shall  we  treat  the  fortimes  which  come 
into  our  hands  as  a  trust  to  be  exercised  for  the  benefit 
of  the  people,  rigidly  abstaining  from  its  abuse  our- 
selves, and  unsparingly  refusing  to  associate  with  others 
who  abuse  it?  No  American  has  a  right  to  claim  a 
share  in  the  glory  of  the  Pilgrim  Fathers  if  he  has  any 
doubt  concerning  his  answer.     Let  us  throw  ourselves, 

4 


THE  DEMANDS  OF  THE   TWENTIETH  CENTURY 

heart  and  soul,  on  that  side  of  the  industrial  question 
which  proves  us  worthy  of  Puritan  ancestry,  —  the  side 
which  regards  wealth  as  a  trust,  to  be  used  in  behalf  of 
the  whole  people  and  m  the  furtherance  of  the  purposes 
of  God's  government. 

Abroad  and  at  home  the  issue  is  defining  itseK.  We 
have  the  chance  to  prove  whence  we  are  sprung.  We 
cannot  add  to  the  glory  of  those  whose  deeds  we  cele- 
brate ;  but  we  can  help  to  carry  their  work  one  historic 
step  farther  toward  its  accomplishment.  In  the  words 
of  Abraham  Lincoln,  —  no  less  appropriate  now  than  in 
the  day  when  they  were  first  spoken  at  Gettysburg,  — 
"  It  is  for  us  to  be  dedicated  to  the  great  task  remaining 
before  us;  that  from  these  honored  dead  we  take  in- 
creased devotion  to  that  cause  to  which  they  gave  the 
last  full  measure  of  devotion;  that  we  here  highly 
resolve  that  these  dead  shall  not  have  died  in  vain;  that 
this  nation,  under  God,  shall  have  a  new  birth  of  free- 
dom ;  that  government  of  the  people,  by  the  people,  and 
for  the  people,  shall  not  perish  from  the  earth." 


OUR  STANDARDS  OF  POLITICAL 
MORALITY 

An  unusually  well-informed  foreign  critic  —  Mr.  Muir- 
head,  whose  character  as  a  dispassionate  observer  is  weU 
attested  by  the  fact  that  he  has  written  several  of  Baede- 
ker's handbooks — has  recently  pubHshed  the  opinion 
that  the  standard  of  personal  morality  in  America  is 
decidedly  higher  than  in  England,  that  of  commercial 
morality  probably  a  little  lower,  and  that  of  pohtical 
morality  quite  distinctly  lower.  His  statement,  thus 
formulated,  undoubtedly  represents  a  consensus  of 
opinion  of  well-informed  observers  on  both  sides  of  the 
Atlantic.  The  causes  for  this  condition  of  things  de- 
mand serious  attention.  A  failure  to  carry  into  politics 
the  same  kind  of  ethical  standard  which  is  apphed  in 
matters  of  personal  morals  imphes,  as  a  rule,  that  there 
is  something  in  a  people's  political  conditions  to  whose 
understanding  it  has  not  fully  grown  up.  Such  a  failure 
implies  a  defect  in  public  judgment  rather  than  a  weak- 
ness in  individual  character.  It  indicates  that  we  do  not 
know  what  virtues  must  be  exercised  for  the  maintenance 
of  organized  society  as  weU  as  we  know  what  virtues  are 
necessary  to  the  harmonious  living  of  individuals  among 
their  neighbors. 

The  difference  between  standards  of  political  morality 
and  of  personal  morality  attracted  attention  even  in  the 
days  of  Plato  and  Aristotle.     From  that  time  onward 

6 


OUR   STANDARDS  OF  POLITICAL  MORALITY 

every  moralist  who  has  really  studied  the  subject  has 
recognized  that  there  were  certain  distinctive  political 
virtues,  elements  superlatively  necessary  in  the  conduct 
of  a  good  ruler  or  member  of  the  ruling  class,  which 
may  be  relatively  less  important  in  matters  outside  the 
sphere  of  politics.  What  is  to  be  regarded  as  par  excel- 
lence the  virtue  of  the  ruler  and  the  freeman  is  a  ques- 
tion which  is  answered  differently  in  different  stages  of 
society.  In  the  earliest  developments  of  civilization 
stress  is  chiefly  laid  on  courage  which  can  maintain 
authority;  in  a  later  stage  greater  importance  is  atn 
tached  to  the  habit  of  self-restraint  which  will  submit  to 
the  authority  of  a  general  code  of  law ;  while  in  a  still 
later  development  at  least  equal  prominence  must  be 
given  to  public  spirit,  which  will  use  for  a  collective  or 
unselfish  end  the  measure  of  authority  bestowed  on  each 
individual.  American  society  has  witnessed  the  passage 
from  the  first  stage  to  the  second ;  much  must  be  done 
before  we  have  attained  to  the  third. 

In  the  beginnings  of  civilization  the  virtue  of  courage 
is  a  necessary  prerequisite  for  any  and  all  government. 
When  people  so  far  emerge  from  superstition  that  they 
come  to  distrust  the  authority  of  the  old  priesthood, 
a  strong  and  fearless  hand  is  needed  to  create  a  recog- 
nized police  authority  which  can  repress  license  and 
disorder.  Whoever  has  this  courage  will  have  the 
authority  in  his  hands;  for  without  it  there  is  no 
authority  at  all.  If  it  is  possessed  by  but  few,  we  shall 
have  an  oligarchy;  the  more  widely  it  is  diffused  the 
more  nearly  shall  we  approach  democracy.  So  indis- 
pensable is  such  courage  to  the  maintenance  of  social 
order,  that  society  in  its  early  stages  will  condone  in  the 
possessors  of  courage  and  fighting  efficiency  the  want  of 
many  other  virtues ;  will  let  them  vindicate  the  majesty 

7 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

of  the  law  by  hanging  the  wrong  man  if  the  right  man 
is  not  to  be  found ;  will  let  them  assert  their  authority 
to  make  laws  by  an  assumption  of  an  authority  in  their 
own  person  to  break  the  laws  which  they  have  made ; 
and  will  despise  or  suppress  the  "  base  mechanical "  who 
would  protest  against  this  arbitrary  infraction  of  legal 
principle. 

But  the  "  base  mechanicals,"  thus  unceremoniously 
despised  in  a  nation's  beginnings,  prove  a  necessity  for 
its  progress  beyond  those  beginnings.  The  State,  as 
Aristotle  says,  having  begun  as  a  means  of  making  life 
possible,  continues  as  a  means  of  making  life  prosperous. 
When  once  the  necessary  basis  of  authority  is  established, 
that  authority  becomes  with  each  generation  more  im- 
partial and  more  absolute,  protecting  the  laborer  as  weU 
as  the  soldier  or  politician.  The  brave  citizen  can  in 
these  later  generations  best  serve  the  cause  of  his 
country,  not  by  an  excess  of  personal  zeal  in  chastising 
those  who  do  him  wrong,  but  by  a  readiness  to  submit 
his  claims  to  the  arbitrament  of  tribunals  which  have 
been  established  for  the  determination  of  justice.  Forti- 
tudo  gives  place  to  temperantia  as  the  characteristic 
virtue  of  the  freeman.  This  change  is  manifest  in  every 
department  of  human  activity  as  soon  as  it  advances 
beyond  a  certain  rudimentary  stage.  Fighting  ceases  to 
be  a  matter  of  personal  courage,  and  becomes  a  matter 
of  discipline,  so  that  the  ideal  soldier  is  no  longer  the 
leader  of  a  cavalry  charge,  but  the  organizer  of  victory, 
who  can  give  and  take  orders  as  part  of  a  larger  whole. 
Success  in  business  is  no  longer  the  perquisite  of  the 
venturesome  trader  who  starts  on  a  voyage  of  explorar 
tion,  but  of  the  painstaking  merchant  who  understands 
the  laws  of  supply  and  demand,  and  can  regulate  his 
conduct  by  those   laws.     In  short,   the   whole  feudal 

8 


OUR   STANDARDS   OF  POLITICAL  MORALITY 

organization  of  society,  where  authority  rests  on  courage 
and  obedience  is  rendered  in  return  for  personal  pro- 
tection, gives  place  to  a  newer  and  larger  order,  where 
the  authority  of  permanent  principles  is  recognized  as 
superior  to  that  of  any  individual,  however  courageous, 
and  where  obedience  is  no  badge  of  servitude,  but  a  duty 
which  rests  on  every  law-abiding  citizen. 

Through  these  two  stages,  which  it  has  taken  Europe 
centuries  to  accomplish,  America  has  been  passing  in  a 
comparatively  brief  period.  First  we  have  had  the 
lawless  frontier  community,  where  men  have  such 
rights  as  they  can  defend  with  their  own  revolvers; 
where  in  case  of  emergency  the  vigilante,  who  takes 
the  law  into  his  own  hands,  is  the  most  necessary  of 
citizens ;  where  the  necessity  for  the  presence  of  Judge 
Lynch  is  so  sharply  recognized  that  his  occasional  mis- 
takes are  condoned;  and  where  absence  of  power  to 
insist  on  one's  own  rights  is  almost  as  bad  as  having 
no  rights  at  all.  With  the  necessity  for  more  regular 
investment  and  employment  of  capital  and  the  estab- 
lishment of  the  police  authority  which  is  coincident 
with  that  employment,  the  virtues  and  vices  of  the 
frontiersman  pass  out  of  political  prominence,  and  we 
reach  a  stage  where  the  standard  of  social  success  is 
found  in  playing  with  keenness  the  games  of  commerce 
and  of  politics ;  where  every  man  is  expected  to  submit 
to  the  law  of  which  he  becomes  a  part ;  but  where,  as 
long  as  he  keeps  within  the  rules  set  by  that  law,  all 
things  are  condoned  which  do  not  pass  that  line  of 
meanness  or  violent  immorality  which  disqualifies  a 
man  from  associating  personally  with  his  fellow-men. 

The  suddenness  of  the  change  has  been  attended  with 
all  the  exaggeration  to  which  sudden  social  movements 
are  liable.     In  Europe  the  men  who  exercised  authority 

9 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

in  virtue  of  their  courage  were  only  gradually  displaced 
by  those  who  did  so  in  virtue  of  their  astuteness.  The 
earlier  standard  of  military  virtue  as  a  qualification 
for  social  distinction  persisted  long  after  it  had  ceased 
to  be  the  main  requisite  for  success  in  business  and  in 
politics,  or  even  in  war  itself.  Traditions  as  to  the  use 
of  wealth  which  had  survived  from  earlier  times  exer- 
cised a  potent  influence  even  upon  those  who  had 
amassed  that  wealth  by  the  methods  peculiar  to  later 
ones.  A  man  who  would  have  that  standing  in  the 
community  which  for  most  men  is  the  chief  object  of 
ambition  was  compelled  to  pay  his  respects  to  tlie  past 
no  less  than  to  the  present.  In  America  the  case  was 
different.  The  flood  of  industrial  settlement  swept  so 
rapidly  into  the  districts  which  but  a  short  time  before 
had  been  the  habitat  of  the  miner  or  the  ranclunan  that 
it  obliterated  as  with  a  sponge  the  traces  of  the  social 
order  of  a  ruder  time.  Unhampered  by  precedent,  each 
man  set  out  to  make  his  fortune  in  a  world  where  all 
were  from  one  standpoint  peaceful  citizens  and  from 
another  absolute  adventurers.  Life  in  the  half-settled 
communities  of  the  United  States  became  a  game  in 
a  sense  which  it  perhaps  never  had  been  before;  a 
game  played  by  a  series  of  accepted  rules,  and  where 
no  tradition  or  code  of  etiquette  not  incorporated  in 
the  rules  counted  for  anything  at  all.  The  result  has 
been  an  exaltation  of  the  principles  pecuhar  to  one 
stage  of  the  world's  history  to  an  unquestioned  su- 
premacy which  they  have  elsewhere  sought  in  vain. 

As  long  as  the  conditions  remained  which  gave  birth 
to  this  state  of  things  —  free  land,  abundance  of  oppor- 
tunities, a  body  of  men  possessed  of  physical  and  mental 
soundness,  and  starting  to  play  the  game  with  approxi- 
mately equal  chances  —  so  long  did  the  moral  and  pohti- 

10 


OUR   STANDARDS   OF  POLITICAL  MORALITY 

cal  standards  which  were  based  upon  these  conditions 
prove  themselves  tolerably  adequate  for  the  purpose  in 
hand.  They  might  be  criticised  by  outside  observers  as 
incomplete,  wanting  in  background,  crude,  perhaps  repul- 
sive ;  but  they  at  least  enabled  a  vast  social  machine  to  be 
run  with  a  great  deal  of  aggregate  happiness  and  with 
less  glaring  violation  of  justice  than  had  been  exemplified 
in  any  other  machine  to  which  the  critics  could  point. 

With  a  change  in  conditions  this  degree  of  success  was 
less  fully  assured.  And  this  change  has  already  come 
about.  Organization  in  business,  in  local  politics,  and 
in  national  politics  has  brought  with  it  an  inequality 
of  opportunity  and  an  unfairness  of  conditions  under 
which  the  game  of  life  is  played.  Competitive  business 
is  giving  place  to  trusts.  The  town  meeting  has  been 
supplanted  by  the  organized  municipality.  The  old 
federation  of  States,  with  its  strong  traditions  of  home 
rule,  has  become  a  centralized  nation,  reaching  out  be- 
yond its  old  borders  to  rule  over  other  nations  less 
civilized  than  itself. 

Under  these  circumstances  it  becomes  impossible  for 
the  community  to  rest  complacently  in  that  egoistic 
morality  which  seemed  sufficient  for  the  needs  of  a 
generation  earlier.  We  can  no  longer  rely  on  competi- 
tion to  protect  the  consumers  against  abuse  when  in- 
dustry has  become  so  highly  organized  that  all  production 
is  centralized  in  the  control  of  a  single  body.  It  is  no 
longer  true,  in  the  sense  that  it  was  true  fifty  years  ago, 
that  each  man  may  be  left  free  to  manage  his  own  busi- 
ness, and  that  the  community  will  find  its  work  best 
done  as  a  consequence  of  such  freedom.  Commerce  and 
industry  are  no  longer  to  be  regarded  as  games  where 
we  have  nothing  to  do  but  to  applaud  the  most  skilful 
player  when  he  wins,  and  rest  in  the  assurance  that  his 

11 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

triumph  is  in  line  with  the  best  interests  of  the  com- 
munity as  a  whole.  What  once  was  regarded  as  a  game 
has  now  become  a  trust;  not  merely  in  the  superficial 
and  accidental  sense  in  which  the  name  "trust"  is 
applied  to  all  large  combinations  of  capital,  but  in  a 
profounder  sense,  as  a  public  function  intrusted  to  those 
who  control  large  capital  which  they  can  exercise  well 
or  ill  at  their  pleasure,  without  adequate  restraint  from 
any  quarter.  Where  competition  is  thus  become  a 
remote  contingency,  and  where  law  is  almost  necessarily 
inadequate  unless  it  be  made  so  strict  as  to  forbid  the 
good  no  less  than  the  evil  in  private  business  enterprise, 
a  new  system  of  ethics  is  a  matter  of  vital  necessity  for 
the  American  people.  This  new  system  must  not  regard 
the  director  as  an  individual  pursuing  private  business 
of  his  own.  It  must  not  allow  him  to  resent  the  sugges- 
tion that  he  shall  conduct  this  business  unselfishly.  It 
must  regard  him  as  having  moral  responsibilities  to  his 
stockholders,  to  his  workingmen,  and  to  the  consumers 
that  purchase  his  goods  or  his  services.  In  the  absence 
of  such  an  ethical  advance,  no  political  or  legal  solution 
of  the  so-called  trust  problem  is  likely  to  be  effective. 
Demagogues  will  continue  to  meet  it  with  prohibitions 
which  do  not  prohibit.  Visionaries  will  attempt  to 
limit  its  abuses  by  semi-socialistic  measures  that  are 
readily  evaded.  But  each  of  these  classes  will  tend  to 
perpetuate  the  evils  which  it  is  trjdng  to  check.  They 
are  attempting  to  reform  by  improved  legal  machinery 
matters  for  which  there  can  be  no  real  remedy  without 
improved  commercial  morality. 

Nor  are  we  better  protected  against  the  abuses  of 
public  trusts  than  against  those  of  private  ones.  Our 
old-fashioned  methods  of  representative  government 
have  not  proved  adequate  to  guard  us  against  the  evils 

12 


OUR  STANDARDS  OF  POLITICAL  MORALITY 

incident  to  the  working  of  administrative  machinery  in 
our  cities,  our  States,  and  our  country  as  a  whole.  In  old 
times  legislatures  were  regarded  chiefly  as  fields  for 
debate  between  the  champions  of  different  interests.  A 
representative  assembly,  whose  members  came  from  dif- 
ferent districts,  was  admirably  adapted  to  secure  this 
end.  The  presence  of  men  from  every  locality  was 
sufficient  protection  against  the  adoption  of  measures 
through  ignorance  of  the  needs  of  the  several  sections 
to  prevent  that  which  would  result  in  unfair  sacrifices. 
But  with  the  substitution  of  the  work  of  actual  govern- 
ment for  that  of  discussion,  the  representative  assembly 
no  longer  proves  equally  weU  adapted  for  our  purposes. 
It  becomes  an  arena  for  contests  between  conflicting 
claims,  rather  than  for  the  interchange  and  reconciliation 
of  differing  views.  It  becomes  a  field  where  political 
organization  can  exercise  its  fullest  sway ;  a  field  where 
the  self-interest  of  the  several  parts,  instead  of  becom- 
ing a  means  for  the  promotion  of  the  welfare  of  the 
whole,  becomes  too  often  a  means  toward  its  spoliation. 
With  the  increasing  scale  on  which  public  business  is 
now  conducted,  it  has  undergone  a  change  analogous 
to  that  which  we  see  in  private  business.  It  has  become 
a  trust  in  a  deeper  sense  than  it  was  a  generation  or  two 
ago.  A  wider  discretionary  power  for  good  or  ill  is 
placed  in  the  hands  of  those  by  whom  the  public  affairs 
of  the  city  or  State  are  conducted.  These  affairs  wiU 
not  be  safe  while  politics  is  regarded  as  a  game,  any 
more  than  private  interests  are  safe  while  commerce 
is  regarded  as  a  game.  Nor  can  they  be  made  safe  by 
any  constitutional  machinery,  however  well  devised, 
unless  we  have  the  right  kind  of  public  sentiment 
behind  it.  A  moderate  degree  of  reform  is  indeed 
possible   by  fixing  the   responsibility  in  the  hands  of 

13 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

a  single  person  instead  of  dividing  it  among  so  many 
as  to  neutralize  at  once  the  power  for  good  and  the 
accountability  for  evil.  But  this  change,  however  salu- 
tary and  even  necessary  in  the  conduct  of  municipal 
or  State  business,  is  far  from  meeting  the  whole  evil. 
Until  there  is  a  fundamental  reform  in  the  code  of 
political  ethics  which  the  community  imposes  upon  its 
members,  public  trusts  wiU  be  no  more  adequately 
controlled  than  private  ones.  Nay,  they  are  likely  to  be 
even  less  adequately  controlled;  because  a  public  offi- 
cial, holding  his  power  as  a  tool  of  a  ring  and  acknowl- 
edging no  allegiance  to  standards  higher  than  those 
which  have  made  his  organization  successful,  is  as  a 
rule  more  firmly  intrenched  in  authority  than  the 
representative  of  any  private  corporation,  however  ex- 
tensive and  powerful.  Until  a  change  of  ethical  ideas 
is  effected,  the  socialistic  ideal  of  reforming  abuse  of 
private  trust  by  the  substitution  of  public  trust  will  be 
but  a  substitution  of  one  set  of  masters  for  another. 

If  this  difficulty  is  felt  in  internal  affairs,  where  those 
who  suffer  are  at  any  rate  citizens  and  men  of  action, 
with  the  power  to  make  their  protests  heard  even  where 
they  cannot  make  their  resistance  successful,  much  worse 
will  it  be  in  dealing  with  colonies  and  dependencies. 
The  history  of  our  Indian  relations  has  proved  how 
much  real  immorality  may  characterize  the  public  deal- 
ings of  a  people  who  in  their  private  dealings  with  one 
another  are  habitually  honest  and  straightforward. 
Whenever  we  govern  a  race  so  inferior  that  it  is  not,  and 
in  the  nature  of  things  cannot  be,  adequately  represented 
in  our  councils,  one  of  two  things  must  happen :  either 
it  will  be  left  a  victim  of  the  most  unscrupulous  office- 
holders —  as  in  the  case  aUuded  to  —  or  it  will  be  cham- 
pioned by  disinterested  men,  not  as  a  means  for  their  own 

14 


OUR   STANDARDS   OF  POLITICAL   MORALITY 

political  success,  but  as  a  duty  which  they  owe  to  their 
own  moral  natures.  Under  an  imperialistic  policy  our 
government  cannot  remain  what  it  was.  It  must  grow 
either  worse  or  better.  It  cannot  remain  a  game,  in 
which  the  struggle  for  success  is  as  far  as  possible 
dissociated  from  the  moral  sense  of  the  participants.  It 
will  involve  either  a  direct  breach  of  trust  or  a  direct 
acceptance  of  trust. 

Our  own  experience  with  problems  other  than  these, 
and  the  experience  of  England  with  this  particular 
problem,  both  warrant  us  in  the  belief  that  we  shall 
move  toward  a  better  solution  rather  than  toward  a 
worse.  England's  first  political  dealings  in  India  were 
characterized  by  methods  totally  indefensible.  The 
career  of  Warren  Hastings  is  an  example  of  how  a 
really  great  man  may  be  infected  by  a  disordered  public 
morality.  But  the  very  powerlessness  of  India  to  pro- 
tect itself  against  official  abuse  brought  home  to  the 
English  mind  the  fact  that  public  unmorality  meant 
pubhc  immorality.  We  need  not  go  so  far  as  to  assert 
that  the  reform  of  the  English  civil  service  and  the 
purification  of  English  pohtics  were  the  results  of  ex- 
periences in  India  and  the  colonies.  This  is  a  dis- 
puted point.  But  we  can  at  any  rate  see  that  the  very 
weakness  of  England's  dependencies  has  compelled  the 
young  men  of  England,  as  they  go  out  into  official 
duties  in  these  lands,  to  adopt  the  position  of  pro- 
tectors, and  the  responsibihty  which  attaches  to  such  a 
relation,  rather  than  the  position  of  adventurers  who 
seek  their  fortunes  in  the  opportunity  of  personal  gain. 
The  development  of  this  mental  attitude  was  in  some 
respects  less  difficult  in  England  than  it  will  be  in 
America,  because  there  was  in  England  a  survival  of 
certain  traditions  from  the  earher  mihtary  age  of  society 

15 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

which  made  social  success  depend  far  more  upon  the 
acceptance  of  responsibility  than  upon  the  achievement 
of  eminence  in  business  or  in  politics.  Yet  in  spite  of 
this  difference,  we  may  look  forward  to  the  future  with 
confidence.  A  country  like  ours,  which  has  in  so  many 
of  its  parts  passed  in  a  single  generation  from  the  law- 
lessness of  frontier  life  to  the  legality  of  organized 
commerce,  may  readily,  in  a  generation  more,  pass  from 
a  conception  of  public  duty  that  is  bounded  by  legality 
alone  to  one  which  is  inspired  by  a  sense  of  moral  obli- 
gation; and  learn  to  carry  into  the  conduct  of  pubhc 
affairs  those  principles  and  sentiments  which  we  recog- 
nize as  binding  upon  the  individual  in  his  private  deal- 
ings with  his  fellow-men. 


le 


GOVERNMENT  BY  PUBLIC  OPINION 

Theee  are  two  quite  distinct  theories  of  democratic 
government,  —  the  individualistic  and  the  sociaUstic.  The 
former  relies  mainly  on  the  self-interest  of  the  various 
citizens,  acting  independently,  as  a  means  of  determining 
and  promoting  the  general  welfare.  The  latter  relies 
mainly  on  the  votes  of  those  citizens  acting  as  a  body. 
The  individuahst  believes  that  the  selfish  conduct  of 
each  man  and  woman,  if  properly  enlightened  and  sub- 
jected to  a  certain  necessary  minimimi  of  restraint,  can 
be  trusted  to  work  out  results  which  will  conduce  to 
the  good  of  the  body  poHtic.  The  socialist  beheves  that 
this  good  must  be  sought  by  the  collective  action  of  the 
people ;  and  that  the  machinery  of  government,  by  giving 
effect  to  those  measures  which,  after  proper  discussion, 
the  majority  of  the  people  beheve  to  be  desirable,  is  the 
agency  on  which  we  must  place  our  chief  confidence  for 
the  solution  of  political  and  industrial  problems. 

Most  thoughtful  men  would  agree  that  neither  of  these 
theories  has  proved  wholly  satisfactory. 

Of  the  individuahstic  theory,  this  is  now  quite  univer- 
sally admitted.  Even  those  who  emphasize  most  clearly 
what  self-interest  has  done  for  political  and  industrial 
progress  are  compelled  to  recognize  that  it  will  not  do 
everything.  Its  successes  have  been  great,  but  they 
have  not  been  unmixed  with  failures.  It  is  a  powerful 
stimulant,  but  it  is  by  no  means  that  panacea  for  social 
2  17 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

ills  which  so  many  economists  and  moralists  have  con- 
sidered, it.  The  exalted  hopes  of  the  individualistic 
philosophers  during  the  first  half  of  the  nineteenth  cen- 
tury have  been  followed  during  the  second  half  by  a 
correspondingly  depressing  reaction. 

Down  to  the  beginning  of  that  century,  business  had 
been  hedged  about  by  a  multitude  of  restrictions  which 
had  been  thought  necessary  for  the  general  good.  The 
removal  of  these  restrictions  proved  to  be  of  great  benefit. 
By  giving  a  man,  as  far  as  possible,  the  right  to  enjoy 
what  he  produced,  we  furnished  him  the  best  motive  to 
work.  We  were  thus  able  to  dispense  with  the  necessity 
of  serfdom,  and  obtained  much  more  effective  service 
under  free  labor  than  ever  was  possible  under  compul- 
sion. By  guaranteeing  a  man  the  right  to  the  un- 
hampered use  of  what  he  possessed,  we  stimulated  the 
accumulation  of  capital,  and  thus  developed  new  methods 
of  production  which  helped  the  community  even  more 
than  they  enriched  the  individual  possessor.  We  were 
able  to  arrange  a  system  of  competition  which  prevented 
trade  from  degenerating  into  a  %ht  between  buyer  and 
seller,  and  utilized  it  as  a  means  of  mutual  advantage. 
The  institution  of  private  property  was  thus  made  a 
vast  machine  for  turning  self-interest  to  the  service  of 
the  body  politic.  The  literature  of  political  economy,  in 
the  hands  of  Adam  Smith  and  his  successors,  was  occu- 
pied with  developing  the  advantages  of  economic  free- 
dom ;  in  other  words,  with  showing  how  the  enlightened 
selfishness  of  each  individual  could  be  made  to  contribute 
to  the  good  of  others  as  well  as  of  himself. 

Nor  have  these  theories  been  confined  to  the  field  of 
economics.  Outside  of  the  realm  of  business,  we  have  been 
developing  a  set  of  moral  precepts  based  on  enlightened 
selfishness.     Instead  of  compelling  the  people  to  obey 


GOVERNMENT  BY  PUBLIC  OPINION 

laws  because  they  were  imposed  by  a  superior  authority, 
we  have  striven  to  show  that  they  have  a  personal  inter- 
est in  obeying  such  laws  —  that  by  a  violation  of  pubhc 
advantage  they  will  in  the  long  run  hurt  themselves 
scarcely  less  than  they  hurt  others.  Not  a  few  writers 
have  gone  so  far  as  to  proclaim  that  this  is  the  only 
rational  basis  of  social  obhgations,  and  that  the  attempt 
to  impose  any  other  theory  upon  a  democratic  commun- 
ity is  an  insult  to  its  intelligence. 

The  restrictions  contained  in  the  old  systems  of  class 
legislation,  both  on  business  and  on  personal  conduct, 
had  been  so  arbitrary  that  their  abohtion  was  of  itself 
an  improvement ;  and  a  moderately  enlightened  degree 
of  self-interest  could  hardly  fail  of  producing  better 
business  and  better  conduct.  But  as  matters  have  ad- 
vanced farther,  we  see  that  the  consequences  of  this 
freedom,  though  preferable  to  the  system  which  they 
superseded,  are  not  in  every  respect  ideal.  What  might 
result  if  all  men  were  sufficiently  intelligent  to  work 
them  out  to  the  best  advantage  is  a  doubtful  question, 
which  I  shall  not  attempt  to  discuss.  What  does  result, 
under  the  existing  degree  of  inteUigence,  is  a  mixture  of 
good  and  evil,  better  than  that  which  existed  a  century 
ago,  but  far  short  of  anything  with  which  we  can  rest  sat- 
isfied. Even  in  the  field  of  economics  we  have  learned 
that  the  coincidence  of  private  interest  and  public  inter- 
est cannot  be  made  complete.  However  much  we  may 
preach  the  blessings  of  competition,  we  find  that  there 
are  many  cases  in  which  competition  will  not  work. 
However  warmly  we  may  champion  the  benefits  of  free 
labor  and  free  capital,  we  reach  a  stage  of  development 
where  the  one  cannot  be  obtained  without  considerable 
sacrifice  of  the  other.  We  have  come  to  a  point  where 
we  regard  the  principles  of  political  economy  in  their 

19 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

true  light,  as  a  valuable  scientific  discovery,  but  not  in 
their  false  light,  as  a  cure  for  every  industrial  wrong. 

The  failure  of  the  socialistic  principle  of  government 
by  the  will  of  the  majority  is  less  universally  admitted. 
The  theory  seems  so  plausible  that  people  are  inclined  to 
overlook  its  historical  fallacies  and  its  practical  failures. 
Modem  democracy  has  in  its  hands  a  vast  political 
machinery,  the  legacy  left  by  the  monarchical  or  aristo- 
cratic systems  of  government  which  it  has  superseded. 
The  social  democrats  beheve  that  by  the  use  of  this 
machinery  the  voters  can  obtain  all  the  benefits  which 
the  older  systems  enjoyed  in  the  way  of  coherent  power ; 
and  that  they  can  at  the  same  time  avoid  the  perver- 
sion of  that  power  to  destroy  personal  liberty,  because 
authority  is  now  vested  in  the  whole  body  of  citizens 
instead  of  in  a  single  class. 

But  the  power  for  good,  thus  held  by  modem  democ- 
racy, is  in  some  respects  more  apparent  than  real.  The 
machinery  of  government  is  a  vast  and  complex  thing, 
but  it  is  not  one  which  will  run  itself.  It  has  to  have 
force  behind  it.  In  a  monarchy  or  an  aristocracy  it  is 
easy  to  see  where  the  force  comes  from.  It  is  based  on 
the  superior  military  strength  of  a  single  individual  or  a 
single  class.  Where  one  man  was  pre-eminent  above  all 
others  in  his  fighting  power,  he  had  the  means  of  making 
his  will  respected  at  home  no  less  than  it  was  feared 
abroad.  This  state  of  things  was  seen  in  Homeric  soci- 
ety. When  Hector  fell,  all  the  Trojans  ran;  when 
Achilles  fell,  all  the  Greeks  ran.  It  was  a  necessary 
consequence  that  the  affairs  of  the  home  government 
were  chiefly  ordered  by  men  like  Hector  and  Achilles, 
in  the  interests  of  the  famiUes  which  they  represented. 
Where  military  power  was  somewhat  more  widely  dif- 
fused, there  was  a  similar  widening  of  political  privi- 

20 


GOVERNMENT  BY  PUBLIC  OPINION 

leges.  This  was  seen  in  the  earlier  days  of  the  Roman 
republic.  It  was  seen  on  a  still  larger  scale  in  medisevaJl 
Europe  under  the  feudal  system.  In  either  case  we  had 
an  order  arranged  chiefly  for  the  benefit  of  the  knights, 
who  possessed  the  monopoly  of  fighting  strength.  Aris- 
tocratic government  was  an  engine  for  keeping  each  man 
in  his  place  in  a  social  order  of  this  kind.  The  selfish 
interest  of  the  aristocracy  formed  at  once  the  support 
and  the  danger  of  such  an  order.  It  was  a  support, 
because  it  made  the  government  effective;  it  was  a 
menace,  because  it  insured  its  perversion  in  favor  of  a 
single  class. 

The  invention  of  gunpowder,  and  the  other  changes 
in  military  tactics,  which  made  larger  armies  imperative, 
put  an  end  to  the  monopoly  of  power  which  the  knights 
had  previously  enjoyed.  Democracy  was  an  almost 
necessary  consequence  of  this  change.  The  growth  of 
democratic  government,  with  its  system  of  general  elec- 
tions, put  an  end  to  the  possibility  of  reserving  all  polite 
ical  privileges  for  a  single  group.  This  is  everywhere 
recognized.  An  equally  important  consequence,  how- 
ever, which  is  not  everywhere  recognized,  is  that  it 
did  away  with  much  of  the  force  which  the  older  gov- 
ernments had  behind  them.  Except  in  those  grave  crises 
when  a  wave  of  patriotism  sweeps  over  the  community, 
the  support  on  which  a  democratic  government  rehes 
is  spasmodic  and  accidental.  No  man  except  the  profes- 
sional politician  feels  that  the  government  is  being  run 
in  his  particular  interest.  On  none,  therefore,  except 
the  professional  politician  can  it  rely  for  continuous 
activity  in  giving  effect  to  its  decrees. 

Yet  more  serious  than  this  absence  of  compelling  force 
behind  a  democratic  government,  as  compared  with  an 
aristocratic  or  monarchical  one,  is  the  absence  of  conti- 

21 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

nuity  of  policy  and  tenacity  of  purpose.  A  small  group 
of  men  knows  what  it  wants.  It  pursues  common  in- 
terests, and  it  has  the  power  to  pursue  them  with  an 
unwavering  fidelity.  We  see  this  advantage  illustrated 
when  we  compare  the  diplomacy  of  Russia,  which  is 
managed  by  a  few  men,  with  the  diplomacy  of  England, 
which  is  under  the  control  of  a  great  many  men.  The 
diplomacy  of  Russia  is  steady  in  its  purpose,  ready  to 
wait  when  waiting  is  needed,  quick  to  strike  when 
promptness  is  imperative;  and  it  is  intrusted,  from  be- 
ginning to  end,  to  the  hands  of  acknowledged  experts. 
The  diplomacy  of  England  is,  by  contrast,  vacillating  of 
purpose,  impatient  of  necessary  delays,  unready  in  the 
moment  of  action,  and  handled  by  men  who  are  chosen 
for  reasons  not  wholly  connected  with  fitness  for  their 
work.  What  is  true  of  England  in  this  respect  is  in 
even  larger  measure  true  of  the  United  States.  And 
thus  it  happens  that  Russia,  in  spite  of  the  inferior 
intelligence  of  her  inhabitants  and  the  lesser  material 
resources  at  her  command,  is  in  a  position  to  pursue 
diplomatic  aims  more  surely  and  successfully  than  her 
rivals.  If  this  condition  shows  itself  in  a  field  so  re- 
stricted in  its  character  as  that  of  diplomacy,  where  the 
patriotism  of  the  several  countries  enlists  their  inhabi- 
tants in  a  common  cause,  what  must  we  expect  when  the 
same  difference  of  method  is  applied  to  the  whole  field  of 
domestic  administration,  whose  purposes  are  infinitely 
complex,  and  in  which  the  interests  involved  are  diver- 
gent and  antagonistic  ? 

In  the  face  of  these  difficulties,  it  is  obvious  that 
democratic  government,  to  be  successful  in  what  it  un- 
dertakes, should  be  managed  with  great  caution.  With 
the  inevitable  changes  of  purpose  due  to  the  differing 
results  of   successive   elections,  it  should   confine  its 


GOVERNMENT  BY  PUBLIC  OPINION 

undertakings  to  those  matters  of  policy  which  have  been 
thoroughly  discussed  and  have  pre-eminently  commended 
themselves  to  the  whole  people.  With  the  deficiency  of 
physical  force  for  carrying  its  decrees  into  effect,  it 
should  endeavor  to  restrict  its  action  to  those  fields 
where  there  is  a  sufficient  consensus  of  opinion  and  a 
degree  of  acquiescence  on  the  part  of  the  minority  which 
will  render  a  preponderance  of  force  unnecessary.  But 
this  caution  is  by  no  means  characteristic  of  modem 
popular  governments.  "  The  new  democracy,"  to  quote 
the  words  of  Lord  Farrer,  "is  passionately  benevolent, 
and  passionately  fond  of  power."  Conscious  of  its 
honesty  of  purpose,  it  is  impatient  of  opposition,  and 
contemptuous  of  difficulties,  however  real.  It  under- 
takes a  vast  amount  of  regulation  of  economic  and  social 
Ufe  in  fields  where  two  generations  ago  a  free  govern- 
ment would  scarce  have  dared  to  enter.  In  these  new 
regulations  there  are  many  instances  of  failure,  and  rela- 
tively few  of  success.  We  have  had  much  infringement 
of  personal  liberty,  with  little  or  no  corresponding  benefit 
to  the  community.  Prohibitory  laws  applied  to  places 
where  there  was  no  pubUc  sentiment  behind  them  have 
proved  a  mockery.  Anti-trust  acts  have  been  so  system- 
atically evaded  that  they  have  degenerated  into  a  means 
of  blackmail ;  and  they  have  often  been  so  injudiciously 
drawn  that  their  enforcement  would  have  paralyzed  the 
industry  of  the  community.  There  is  no  need  to  con- 
tinue the  catalogue  of  appropriation  bills  and  currency 
bills,  and  tax  bills  and  labor  bills,  often  devised  with  the 
best  of  intents  of  coercing  the  wicked,  but  ending  in 
nothing  except  evasion  and  inconvenience. 

Nor  is  it  really  possible  that  most  of  them  should  end 
otherwise.  A  statute  passed  by  a  majority  and  in  the 
face  of  a  reluctant  minority  does  not  represent  the  will 

23 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

of  the  people.  It  is  legislation  in  favor  of  one  class, 
wliich  happens  at  the  moment,  through  causes  which 
may  be  good  or  bad,  to  control  a  greater  number  of  votes 
at  the  polls,  and  against  another  class  which  can  control 
a  less  number.  Absolute  majority  rule,  so  far  as  it  is 
really  carried  into  effect,  means  tyrannical  power  in  the 
hands  of  a  weak  and  vacillating  sovereign.  There  is  a 
"curious  poHtical  superstition,"  to  quote  the  phrase  of 
Herbert  Spencer,  that  such  rule  by  majorities  was  a 
fundamental  theory  of  those  men  whose  work  at  the 
close  of  the  last  century  emancipated  America  and 
Europe  from  the  bonds  of  the  aristocratic  system.  But 
history  gives  no  warrant  for  this  behef.  Rousseau 
himself,  the  father  of  modern  democracy,  is  explicit  in 
sajdng  that  the  wish  or  vote  of  a  majority  does  not  neces- 
sarily represent  the  will  of  the  people.  The  Constitution 
of  the  United  States,  far  from  sanctioning  unlimited 
rights  of  the  majority  against  the  minority,  is  filled  from 
beginning  to  end  with  restrictions  upon  the  exercise  of 
such  rights,  —  restrictions  devised  in  the  interest  of  per- 
sonal liberty.  The  Constitution  indeed  provides  for  elec- 
tions to  decide  who  shall  govern  us ;  but  it  in  no  wise 
encourages  the  intrusion  of  the  oflScials  thus  elected  into 
those  fields  of  legislation  where  class  and  personal  inter- 
ests are  arrayed  one  against  the  other. 

Political  aristocracy  being  a  thing  of  the  past,  self- 
interest  an  inadequate  support  for  political  order,  and 
over-legislation  an  evil  worse  than  that  which  it  under- 
takes to  cure,  I  believe  that  we  have  but  one  alternative 
before  us  if  we  would  preserve  our  integrity  as  a  nation. 
"We  must  go  back  to  the  principle  that  a  just  govern- 
ment is  based  on  the  consent  of  the  governed.  Without 
that  consent  we  have  tyranny,  even  though  the  govern- 
ing body  possesses  for  the  moment  a  majority  at  the 

24 


GOVERNMENT  BY  PUBLIC  OPINION 

polls.  Without  that  consent  we  can  have  neither  self- 
government  nor  freedom  in  its  true  sense.  To  maintain 
such  freedom  we  must  accept  the  principle  of  govern- 
ment by  pubUc  sentiment. 

This  is  a  phrase  which  is  often  used,  and  almost  as 
often  ridiculed.  The  men  who  are  engaged  in  what  they 
call  practical  politics  regard  moral  ideas  in  this  field  as 
a  matter  of  slight  importance,  except  in  those  rare 
national  crises  when  the  pubhc  is  thoroughly  roused. 
They  say  that  for  every  instance  of  failure  of  legislation 
without  pubhc  sentiment  behind  it  you  can  give  at  least 
as  glaring  an  instance  of  failure  of  public  sentiment 
without  legislative  and  administrative  machinery  to 
support  it.  They  hold,  in  short,  that  government  by 
moral  ideas  will  not  work. 

I  believe  that  this  view,  though  widely  held,  rests  on 
a  misconception  of  what  public  sentiment  really  is. 

Whenever  a  large  number  of  people  want  a  thing  we 
hear  it  said  that  there  is  a  pubhc  sentiment  in  its  favor. 
This  is  not  necessarily  true.  Even  the  fact  that  a 
majority  may  be  wilHng  to  vote  for  a  measure  does  not 
prove  that  it  has  this  basis.  The  desire  may  be  simply 
the  outcome  of  widespread  personal  interest,  and  may 
not  deserve  in  any  sense  the  name  of  pubHc  sentiment  or 
pubhc  spirit.  Take  the  whole  matter  of  anti-trust  legis- 
lation. Most  people  object  to  trusts.  Why?  Largely 
because  they  do  not  own  them.  If  a  man  really  beheves 
that  a  trust  is  a  bad  thing  and  would  refuse  to  coun- 
tenance its  pursuits  if  he  were  given  a  majority  interest 
in  its  stock,  he  can  fairly  dignify  his  spirit  of  opposition 
to  trusts  by  the  title  of  pubhc  sentiment.  And  it  may  be 
added  that  if  things  are  done  by  trusts  or  by  any  other 
forms  of  economic  organization  which  arouse  this  sort  of 
disinterested  opposition,  they  speedily  work   their  own 

26 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

cure.  If  a  considerable  number  of  influential  men  see 
the  pernicious  effects  of  a  business  practice  sufficiently 
to  condemn  it  in  themselves  as  well  as  in  others,  they 
can  speedily  restrict,  if  they  cannot  wholly  prevent,  its 
continuance.  Most  of  the  effective  control  of  combina- 
tions of  capital  has  been  in  fact  brought  about  by  intel- 
ligent public  opinion  slowly  acting  in  this  way.  If, 
however,  the  critic  is  doing  on  a  small  scale  what  the 
trust  is  practising  on  a  large  scale;  if  he  is  making 
every  effort  to  sell  his  goods  for  as  high  prices  as  pos- 
sible, not  being  over-scrupulous  as  to  the  means  by 
which  this  is  brought  about ;  if  he  in  his  own  way  tries 
to  monopolize  his  market  as  the  ill-managed  trusts  mo- 
nopolize theirs ;  if,  in  short,  he  simply  complains  of  the 
practices  of  the  trusts  because  he  is  at  the  wrong  end  of 
certain  important  transactions,  and  becomes  their  victim 
instead  of  their  beneficiary,  then  his  words  count  for 
nothing.  No  matter  how  many  thousands  of  men  there 
may  be  in  his  position,  their  aggregate  work  is  not  likely 
to  reach  farther  than  the  passage  of  a  certain  amount  of 
ill-considered  and  inoperative  legislation.  Take  another 
instance  from  similar  ground,  —  that  of  the  silver  move- 
ment. Here  the  matter  was  more  complex.  A  certain 
amount  of  agitation  in  favor  of  silver  was  based  on  a 
real  feeling  that  gold  had  appreciated,  and  that  this  pro- 
duced an  unfairness  which  was  repugnant  to  tiie  moral 
sense  of  the  community.  So  far  as  this  state  of  feeling 
existed  the  agitation  had  real  strength,  independent  of 
the  question  whether  the  facts  which  gave  rise  to  this 
feeling  were  rightly  or  wrongly  interpreted.  But  at  least 
an  equally  large  part  of  the  silver  movement  was  based, 
not  on  the  feeling  that  the  exclusive  use  of  gold  hurt 
the  public,  but  on  the  argument  that  it  hurt  certain 
individuals.      When  people   were   therefore    urged  to 

26 


GOVERNMENT  BY  PUBLIC  OPINION 

vote  for  a  change,  not  because  one  kind  of  money  was 
better  for  the  public  than  another,  but  because  it  was 
better  for  them  as  individuals  to  pay  their  debts  in 
cheap  money,  then  the  sUver  agitation  became  an  appeal 
to  class  interests  which  could  command  no  power  except 
that  which  was  represented  by  the  votes  of  the  class  in 
question.  This  does  not  mean  that  the  appeal  to  class 
interests  was  any  less  marked  on  the  other  side ;  but  it 
means  that  even  if  the  movement  had  been  successful, 
the  resulting  laws  would  probably  have  been  inoperative 
in  practice,  because  imposed  by  a  majority  upon  the 
transactions  of  a  reluctant  minority.  It  cannot  be  too 
often  repeated  that  those  opinions  which  a  man  is  pre- 
pared to  maintain  at  another's  cost,  but  not  at  his  own, 
count  for  Httle  in  forming  the  general  sentiment  of  a 
community,  or  in  producing  any  effective  public  move- 
ment. They  are  manifestations  of  boastfulness,  or  envy, 
or  selfishness,  rather  than  of  that  pubhc  spirit  which  is 
an  essential  constituent  in  all  true  public  opinion. 

There  are  some  moralists  who  would  deny  the  possibil- 
ity of  any  such  pubhc  opinion  which  should  be  independ- 
ent of  selfishness,  and  which  should  rise  above  personal 
interests.  But  they  have  the  facts  of  history  against 
them.  Aristotle  has  well  said  that  man  is  a  pohtical 
animal.  He  has  an  instinct  for  forming  communities, 
and  for  acting  in  concert  with  the  fellow  members  of 
those  communities.  Every  such  political  community  or 
unit  has  its  code  of  political  ethics.  Under  the  influence 
of  this  code  a  man  will  do  things  which  are  quite  in- 
dependent of  his  personal  selfishness,  and  which  may 
even  mihtate  against  the  dictates  of  such  selfishness. 
The  spirit  of  patriotism  will  lead  him  to  risk  personal 
suffering  and  death  itself  in  the  service  of  that  commun- 
ity ;  it  will  even  lead  him  to  submit  to  discipline  and  to 

21 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

restraint  which  is  irksome  in  the  extreme.  He  will  ac- 
quiesce in  the  results  of  laws  which  place  burdens  upon 
him  for  the  benefit  of  others.  A  community  in  which 
such  patriotism  and  public  devotion  were  wholly  absent 
could  no  longer  remain  a  people  by  itself.  It  would  be 
daily  threatened  by  conquest  from  without  and  by  disso- 
lution from  within. 

Public  sentiment,  or  pubhc  spirit,  is  the  name  given 
to  the  feeling  which  gives  effect  to  these  virtues.  It 
represents  each  man's  share  in  that  pohtical  conscience 
which  is  as  important  for  the  ordering  of  the  affairs  of 
the  state  as  is  the  personal  conscience  to  the  ordering  of 
the  affairs  of  the  individual.  Public  opinion  is  a  judg- 
ment formed  in  accordance  with  the  dictates  of  this  polit- 
ical conscience,  and  representing  a  theory  which  a  man  is 
prepared  to  apply  against  himself  as  well  as  against  others. 

Where  it  exists,  such  pubhc  opinion  is  not  only  power- 
ful, but  all-powerful.  It  can  accompUsh  more  than  any 
other  coercive  agency  in  the  world.  Take  its  operation, 
on  a  small  scale,  as  brought  out  in  the  recent  hazing 
investigation  at  West  Point.  When  the  pubhc  senti- 
ment of  the  cadet  corps  is  brought  into  conflict  with  the 
regulations  of  the  Academy,  the  unwritten  code  of  honor 
proves  the  stronger.  We  may  differ  as  to  our  opinion 
of  its  merits ;  but  of  its  power  there  can  be  no  question. 
And  the  power  which  is  here  illustrated  on  a  small  scale 
has  been  repeatedly  exemphfied  on  a  large  scale  in  the 
history  of  pubhc  and  private  morals.  What  is  it  that 
has  rendered  murder  a  rare  exception  instead  of  a  fre- 
quent social  event?  It  is  not  the  existence  of  statutes 
which  make  murder  a  crime ;  it  is  the  growth  of  a  pubhc 
opinion  which  makes  the  individual  condemn  himself 
and  his  friends,  as  well  as  his  enemies,  for  indulgence  in 
that  propensity.     There  were  laws  enough  against  mur- 

28 


GOVERNMENT  BY  PUBLIC   OPINION 

der  in  Italy  five  hundred  years  ago ;  but  these  laws  were 
practically  inoperative,  because  they  had  not  really  formed 
part  of  the  social  conscience,  as  they  have  to-day.  On 
the  other  hand,  the  social  conscience  of  mediaeval  Italy, 
with  all  its  laxity  in  the  matter  of  murder,  was  strict  in 
certain  matters  of  commercial  trust,  on  which  it  is  to-day 
relatively  loose.  A  man  actually  forfeited  self-respect  by 
a  questionable  financial  transaction  in  those  days  as  he 
did  not  forfeit  it  by  the  murder  of  two  or  three  of  his 
best  friends.  As  a  consequence,  that  particular  kind  of 
financial  immorahty  was  much  rarer  then  than  it  is  now. 
Such  instances  can  be  indefinitely  multiplied.  What- 
ever may  be  the  dictum  of  the  theoretical  moralist,  no 
student  of  social  order  will  doubt  that  pubhc  sentiment, 
if  once  aroused,  can  be  made  to  dominate  the  action  of 
individuals  and  lead  them  to  do  things  which  from  the 
standpoint  of  selfishness  are  inconvenient  and  irrational. 

But  can  pubhc  sentiment  be  thus  aroused  to  do  any 
large  portion  of  the  work  which  we  now  demand  of  gov- 
ernment ?  Admitting  its  power  in  those  cases  where  it 
already  exists,  can  its  application  be  widened  at  will,  so 
as  to  reach  those  financial  and  social  wrongs  in  which 
the  pursuit  of  self-interest  has  involved  us  ?  This  is  a 
fair  question,  which  must  be  fairly  answered. 

It  may  be  frankly  recognized  that  public  sentiment 
will  not  meet  all  those  evils,  or  accomphsh  all  those 
objects,  for  which  numbers  of  people  now  desire  legis- 
lation. This  fact,  however,  can  be  considered  a  merit 
rather  than  a  fault.  If  any  agency  were  found  to  give 
effect  to  all  the  ill-considered  demands  of  our  major- 
ities, there  would  be  no  more  freedom  in  America  than 
there  is  in  China.  That  it  can  be  made  broad  enough  to 
cover  the  field  where  legislation  has  proved  practical  and 
salutary  is,  I  think,  scarcely  open  to  doubt.     One  or  two 

29 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

instances  will  help  to  illustrate  this.  The  history  of 
liquor  laws  shows  that  the  attempt  to  enforce  proliibi- 
tion  on  all  localities  indiscriminately,  independent  of  the 
pubHc  sentiment  which  lay  behind  them,  resulted  not 
only  in  defiance  of  these  laws,  but  in  degradation  of  the 
authority  of  the  state  itself ;  and  that  the  really  effective 
control  was  accomplished  by  measures  so  framed  that 
pubhc  action  went  hand  in  hand  with  pubHc  opinion. 
The  history  of  railroad  legislation  in  the  United  States 
furnishes  even  more  marked  instances  of  the  same  sort. 
It  has  been  a  pretty  constant  record  of  the  success  of 
measures  which  undertook  little,  but  provided  for  much 
pubhcity,  as  compared  with  measures  which  undertook 
much,  but  tended  to  drive  the  recusants  into  the  dark. 
If  this  has  been  the  case  hitherto,  when  the  development 
of  pubhc  opinion  has  been  treated  as  a  mere  accident, 
how  much  more  may  we  expect  it  to  prove  true  if  the 
principle  were  once  brought  home  to  the  citizens  as  a 
body  that  pubhc  sentiment  was  the  important  thing  on 
which  to  rely,  and  that  they  could  not  afford  to  devolve 
upon  the  legislature  or  the  administration  a  responsibiUty 
which  must  finally  come  home  to  themselves.  That  the 
better  class  of  American  citizens  would  refuse  to  accept 
this  responsibihty  when  thus  squarely  brought  home  to 
them,  I  do  not  for  one  moment  believe.  In  the  matter 
of  personal  morality  they  do  in  fact  accept  it.  In  no 
nation  is  the  influence  of  sympathy  for  others  so  power- 
ful; in  none  are  the  strong  so  ready  to  sacrifice  their 
convenience  to  the  comfort  of  the  weak.  That  these 
methods  are  not  carried  out  in  our  business  and  our  poli- 
tics is,  I  beheve,  due  to  false  theories  of  government, 
accepted  by  the  community  as  a  whole,  which  lead  men 
to  rely  too  much  on  self-interest  and  on  legislation.  If 
our  people  can  accept  cheerfully  those  burdens  involved 

30 


GOVERNMENT  BY  PUBLIC  OPINION 

in  the  duties  of  private  life,  there  is  no  inherent  reason 
why  they  should  fail  to  accept  the  trusts  of  public  life. 
That  they  are  now  inclined  to  make  light  of  their  obliga- 
tions to  others  in  business  and  in  politics,  is  not  due  to 
any  incapacity  for  taking  heavy  obligations  seriously ;  it 
is  due  to  the  fact  that  they  have  been  taught  to  regard 
business  and  politics  as  games,  with  no  obligations  pro- 
founder  than  the  rules,  and  no  authority  higher  than  the 
umpire.  It  is  this  inadequate  conception  of  public 
responsibility,  rather  than  any  reluctance  to  sacrifice 
themselves  where  a  responsibility  is  recognized,  that 
now  stands  in  the  way  of  our  progress. 

What  rules  of  conduct  public  opinion  would  prescribe 
in  order  to  meet  the  political  and  industrial  dangers 
under  which  we  suffer,  it  is  too  early  to  say.  What 
specific  obligations  the  public  conscience,  when  once 
aroused,  would  regard  as  binding  in  matters  like  this, 
we  have  no  time  to  consider  at  present.  It  would  take 
not  one  hour,  but  many,  to  discuss  the  uses  which  could 
be  made  of  such  a  power,  when  once  fully  recognized  as 
a  working  force  in  political  life.  It  is  enough  for  the 
moment  to  call  attention  to  the  fact  that  this  power  ex- 
ists ;  that  it  is  an  instrument  fitted  to  meet  the  most 
urgent  needs  of  society  to-day  —  strong  where  strength 
is  needed,  slow  where  conservatism  is  required,  capable 
of  indefinite  expansion  without  threatening  the  founder 
tions  of  self-government.  It  lies  for  the  time  unused; 
but  it  awaits  only  the  mind  which  shall  discern  its  possi- 
bilities and  the  hand  which  shall  wield  it  in  the  public 
interest.  To  the  men  who  will  thus  see  it  and  use  it  it 
offers  the  opportunity  to  become  leaders  in  a  higher  type 
of  social  order  than  any  which  the  world  has  yet  seen,  — 
an  order  in  which  the  principle  of  noblesse  oblige  is  recog- 
nized, not  as  the  exclusive  glory  of  one  class,  but  as  a 

31 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

democratic  possession  which  imposes  its  honorable  bur- 
dens upon  the  whole  body  of  the  people. 

The  question  is  often  asked  what  constitutes  the  essen- 
tial mark  of  a  gentleman,  as  distinct  from  the  accidents 
of  birth  and  of  clothes,  of  manners  and  of  speech.  I 
believe  it  is  to  be  found  in  the  readiness  to  accept  trusts, 
even  when  they  are  personally  disadvantageous,  —  the 
readiness  to  subordinate  a  man's  own  convenience  and 
desires  to  a  social  code.  The  code  may  be  a  good  one  or 
a  bad  one ;  but  it  is  an  authority  which  the  gentleman 
accepts  of  his  own  free  will,  without  waiting  for  any  one 
to  compel  him  to  accept  it.  To  the  extent  that  he  does 
this,  he  not  only  proves  himself  a  gentleman,  but  proves 
himself  capable  of  seH-govemment.  In  this  sense  I 
beheve  that  the  great  body  of  the  American  people 
are  gentlemen;  and  that  this  is  the  best  guarantee  for 
the  permanence  of  our  system  of  self-government  amid 
the  increasing  difficulties  with  which  it  has  to  deal. 
There  is  much  which  is  as  yet  defective  in  our  commer- 
cial and  pohtical  code  of  honor.  But  the  fundamental 
fault  is  in  the  code  and  not  in  the  man ;  and  therefore 
the  task  of  the  reformer  is  no  insuperable  one. 

The  tiling  that  makes  democracy  practicable  is  a  will- 
ingness, on  the  part  of  the  mass  of  the  people,  to  submit 
to  self-imposed  authority  without  waiting  for  the  police- 
man to  enforce  it.  The  cause  of  democracy  was,  as  we 
have  seen,  the  distribution  of  fighting  power,  which  for- 
merly had  been  confined  to  one  class.  The  possibihty 
of  maintaining  democracy  is  due  to  the  fact  that  the 
readiness  to  accept  self-imposed  burdens  has  gone  hand 
in  hand  with  the  distribution  of  power.  The  danger  of 
democracy  lies  in  the  adoption  of  a  false  code  of  honor, 
which  tolerates  and  approves  the  pursuit  of  self-interest 
in  lines  where  it  must  prove  ultimately  destructive  to 

32 


GOVERNMENT  BY  PUBLIC  OPINION 

the  community.  If  our  men  of  influence  can  see  these 
dangers  in  time  to  submit  to  self-imposed  restrictions, 
they  can  preserve  their  freedom  from  legislative  inter- 
ference, and  our  republic  can  remain,  as  it  now  is,  a  self- 
governing  body.  If  they  do  not  see  it  in  time,  the 
demands  for  the  extension  of  legislative  machineiy  and 
poHce  activity  will  so  far  restrict  our  personal  liberty 
that  democratic  freedom  will  exist  only  in  name,  and  we 
shall  have  a  social  order  where  the  form  of  an  occasional 
election  is  but  a  decent  veil  to  disguise  struggles  for  the 
tyranny  of  one  class  over  another. 

It  is.  for  the  young  men  who  are  coming  on  the  field  of 
pohtical  Hfe  to-day  to  guard  against  this  danger.  Our 
college  students  have  lived  in  communities  which  have 
their  historic  traditions  and  their  collective  aspirations ; 
each  of  which  is  in  a  true  sense  a  body  politic,  with  its 
public  spirit  and  its  public  sentiment.  It  is  for  them  to 
carry  into  the  larger  world  of  business  and  of  legislation 
the  spirit  which  will  subordinate  personal  convenience  to 
collective  honor.  Let  them  cease  to  appeal  exclusively  to 
self-interest,  either  in  their  own  judgment  or  in  the  judg- 
ment of  others.  For  a  political  leader  who  has  not  only 
fixed  standards  of  right,  but  a  behef  in  the  capacity  of 
the  people  to  accept  those  standards,  the  times  are  al- 
ways ready.  Calhoun  and  Clay  and  Webster  and  Lin- 
coln differed  in  their  judgments  and  in  their  conclusions. 
But  it  was  characteristic  of  them  all  that  they  made 
their  final  appeal,  not  to  the  narrow  interests  of  any 
class,  but  to  what  they  believed  to  be  broad  principles 
of  public  opinion  and  pubHc  morality.  It  was  in  the 
spirit  of  these  men  that  our  republic  gained  its  growth 
during  the  century  that  is  past ;  it  is  for  us,  their  sons, 
to  see  that  the  same  spirit  is  applied  to  the  yet  larger 
problems  of  the  century  which  is  to  come. 
3  33 


THE  FORMATION  AND  CONTROL 
OF  TRUSTS 

In  tke  year  1898  the  new  companies  formed  in  the 
United  States  for  purposes  of  industrial  consolidation 
had  an  aggregate  capital  of  over  nine  hundred  million 
doUars.  When  this  fact  first  transpired,  it  was  regarded 
as  surprising.  Now  it  has  become  conmionplace.  For  in 
the  earlier  half  of  1899,  according  to  the  careful  estimate 
of  the  Financial  Chronicle^  the  capital  of  the  new  com- 
panies of  this  character  was  three  thousand  one  hundred 
million  doUars,  or  more  than  three  times  that  of  the 
whole  year  preceding.^ 

It  is  hard  at  once  to  appreciate  the  magnitude  of  these 
figures.  No  single  event  of  a  similar  character,  either 
in  the  American  or  in  the  English  market,  has  involved 
such  large  and  sudden  transmutations  of  capital.  It 
cannot  be  paralleled  in  the  annals  of  railroad  investment. 
Even  in  the  year  1887,  so  conspicuous  in  our  railroad 
history,  the  capital  used  in  building  thirteen  thousand 
miles  of  new  line  can  hardly  have  reached  seven  hundred 
million  dollars.  In  the  whole  period  of  rapid  expansion 
from  1879  to  1882,  the  volume  of  new  railroad  securities 
issued  did  not  equal  the  industrial  issues  of  this  single 
half  year  alone.  Under  such  circumstances  the  mat- 
ter of  industrial  consolidation  becomes  one  of  pressing 

*  $1,981,000,000  common  Btock,  $1,041,000,000  preferred  stock,  and 
$120,000,000  bonds. 

S4 


FORMATION  AND  CONTROL  OF  TRUSTS 

importance.  Is  this  a  transient  movement,  or  is  it  a 
manifestation  of  permanent  tendencies  ?  How  far  is  it 
likely  to  go?  To  what  limits,  commercial  or  legal,  is 
it  subject?  How  are  its  evils  to  be  avoided?  Is  it, 
as  the  socialists  claim,  a  stepping-stone  toward  a  new 
organization  of  industry  under  government  authority? 
These  are  the  questions  which  must  be  asked  and 
answered. 

It  is  safe  to  say  at  the  outset  that  this  movement  is 
not  likely  to  continue  long  at  the  rate  which  it  is  now 
maintaining.  While  some  of  the  industrial  issues  repre- 
sent an  investment  of  new  capital,  a  much  larger  number 
represent  a  conversion  of  old  capital.  To  such  con- 
version there  is,  of  course,  a  natural  limit,  when  all,  or 
nearly  all,  the  older  enterprises  in  an  industry  have 
become  consolidated.  Of  the  three  thousand  million 
dollars  of  securities  placed  on  the  market  in  the  first 
half  of  the  year  1899,  it  is  doubtful  whether  one 
thousand  million,  or  even  five  hundred  million,  reaUy 
represent  new  capital  put  into  the  various  lines  of  busi- 
ness enterprise.  Measured  in  dollars  and  cents,  the 
industrial  growth  is  a  comparatively  small  element  in 
this  movement,  and  the  financial  change  of  form  a  much 
larger  one.  We  may,  I  think,  go  a  step  farther,  and  say 
that  in  no  small  part  of  these  enterprises  the  financial 
motive  of  rendering  the  securities  marketable  is  at 
present  more  prominent  than  the  industrial  motive  of 
rendering  the  operations  of  the  consolidated  company 
more  efficient. 

Let  us  see  what  is  the  difference  between  these  two 
kinds  of  motives,  and  how  they  operate  at  the  present 
juncture. 

A  man  who  invests  his  money  in  a  business  has  two 
distinct  objects.     He  wishes  to  secure  as  large  an  income 

35 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

as  possible;  this  is  his  industrial  motive.  He  also 
wishes  to  be  able  to  get  his  money  back  whenever 
he  needs  it,  and  if  possible  to  get  back  more  than  he 
put  in ;  this  is  his  financial  motive.  The  business  must 
be  profitable;  the  security  must  be  marketable.  To  a 
certain  extent  these  two  things  go  hand  in  hand.  An 
investment  which  has  paid  large  and  fairly  regular  divi- 
dends for  a  series  of  years  becomes  known  in  the  local 
security  market,  and  can  be  transferred  to  other  hands 
at  comparatively  slight  sacrifice  in  case  the  owner  desires 
to  sell  it.  But  this  is  only  true  up  to  a  certain  point. 
Some  of  the  things  which  make  an  industry  profitable  to 
the  individual  owner  tend  to  make  its  securities  less 
marketable  instead  of  more  so.  A  local  business  which 
a  man  has  under  his  own  eye,  and  whose  details  he 
knows  by  experience,  may  be  a  very  sure  investment  for 
him,  and  a  relatively  unsafe  one  for  others;  good  to 
hold,  but  bad  to  seU.  The  intimate  personal  knowledge 
which  is  his  protection  becomes  a  possible  menace  to 
other  holders.  The  majority  of  investors  throughout 
the  country  cannot  safely  have  anything  to  do  with  it. 
In  such  an  industry  the  market  value  of  the  stock  when 
it  is  sold  is  apt  to  be  less  than  proportionate  to  its 
income-producing  power. 

A  great  many  of  the  manufacturing  industries  of  the 
country  have  remained  in  this  localised  condition.  If  we 
compare  the  past  history  of  industrial  investments  and 
of  railroad  investments,  we  are  struck  with  the  relative 
narrowness  of  the  market  for  the  former.  The  securities 
of  a  good  railroad  could  find  purchasers  anywhere.  If 
the  price  paid  for  the  stock  was  low  in  proportion  to  the 
return,  it  was  only  because  people  distrusted  its  future 
earning  capacity.  Even  a  small  railroad  might  have  a 
national  reputation  as  an  investment.     The  demand  for 

86 


FORMATION  AND  CONTROL   OF  TRUSTS 

the  securities  of  Iowa  railroads  was  not  in  any  sense 
confined  to  one  State  or  one  section.  As  much  as  ninety- 
seven  per  cent  came  from  districts  remote  from  Iowa. 
But  the  demand  for  the  securities  of  an  Iowa  factory 
was  for  the  most  part  local.  Its  operations  were  not 
performed  under  the  public  eye.  Its  stocks  could  there- 
fore safely  be  held  only  by  those  who  had  private  advan- 
tages for  getting  an  inside  view. 

But  when  an  industry  throughout  the  country  was 
consohdated,  this  condition  rapidly  changed.  A  very 
much  larger  public  was  ready  to  buy  securities  of  the 
American  Sugar  Refineries  Company  or  the  American 
Tobacco  Company  than  would  have  cared  to  invest  in 
any  of  the  individual  concerns  of  which  they  were  com- 
posed. The  national  extent  of  the  organization  gave  the 
holder  of  its  shares  larger  and  steadier  opportunities 
of  converting  his  investment  into  cash  than  he  could 
have  had  when  his  factory  remained  separate  from  the 
others ;  and  it  often,  though  not  always,  enabled  him  to 
reaUze  a  much  higher  price  than  he  otherwise  would 
have  obtained.  While  this  was  not  always  a  dominant 
purpose  in  the  formation  of  these  earlier  "  trusts,"  it  was 
an  incidental  advantage  by  which  their  organizers  were 
quick  to  profit.  Besides  the  motive  of  economy  in  oper- 
ation, which  was  first  urged  as  the  reason  for  enter- 
ing these  combinations,  the  motive  of  selling  securities 
easily  and  at  a  high  price  soon  took  its  place  as  one  of 
co-ordinate  importance. 

Apart  from  this  legitimate  increase  in  the  value  of 
trust  securities,  due  to  the  national  extent  of  industry 
which  enables  them  to  find  a  market  among  a  larger 
circle  of  investors,  there  is  an  illegitimate  increase  due 
to  the  opportunities  which  they  afford  for  manipulation 
by  inside  rings.     There  is  a  fashion  in  investments  as  in 

37 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

everything  else.    A  large  section  of  the  public  buys  the 
kind  of  thing  that  others  are  buying.     Sometimes  it  has 
been  land ;  sometimes  it  has  been  railroads ;  just  now  it 
is  industrials.     In  a  year  of  prosperity,  with  a  slight 
tendency  toward  inflation,  prices  of  all  kinds  of  securi- 
ties tend  to  rise.     The  man  who  has  bought  to  be  in 
fashion  is  pleased  with  the  increase  in  the  nominal  value 
of  his  investment  and  buys  more.     Those  who  are  con- 
nected with  the  management  see  an  opportunity  of  dis- 
posing of  some  or  all  of  their  holdings  to  great  advantage. 
Before  the  inevitable  crash  comes  they  have  converted 
most  of  their  capital  into  money ;  and  the  outside  buyer 
is  a  loser.    Prior  to  the  crisis  of  1873  the  favorite  chance 
for  these  operations  was  found  in  railroad  enterprise; 
but  railroad  traffic  and  railroad  accounts  are  now  «o 
much  supervised  that  the  possibility  of  such  transactions 
in  this  field  is  less  than  it  was  thirty  years  ago.     And, 
what  is  of  still  more  importance,  a  series  of  hard  expe- 
riences  has   made   the   investing  public   quite   shy  of 
dishonest    railroads.      In   manipulating   the   stocks   of 
"industrials,"  the  speculator  finds  these  obstacles  less 
serious.     The  authorities  have  not  learned  to  exercise 
adequate   supervision ;   the  public  has  not  accustomed 
itself  to  use  caution. 

The  buying  of  industrial  securities  simply  because  it 
is  the  fashion  to  do  so  is  bound  to  come  to  an  end.  The 
speculation  now  so  actively  indulged  in  must  reach  its 
own  hmit  in  process  of  time.  When  the  investors  as  a 
body  discover  that  the  system  of  first  and  second  prefer- 
ences is  a  fatally  easy  means  of  putting  an  individual 
security-holder  at  the  mercy  of  a  dishonest  board  of 
directors,  we  shall  probably  witness  an  apparent  stop- 
page in  the  rapid  process  of  industrial  consolidation.  In 
fact,  there  may  be  a  reaction,  and  a  reconversion  of  the 

38 


FORMATION  AND   CONTROL   OF  TRUSTS 

united  companies  into  separate  ones,  if,  as  has  happened 
in  other  cases,  the  unreasoning  fondness  of  the  public 
for  a  particular  form  of  investment  is  followed  by  an 
equally  unreasoning  aversion  of  all  enterprises  of  this 
form,  legitimate  as  well  as  illegitimate.  Such  a  reaction 
has  taken  place  more  than  once  in  the  economic  history 
of  the  nineteenth  century.  Over-speculation  in  English 
railroads  in  1844,  in  American  railroads  in  1873,  in  prod- 
uce warrants  in  1881,  in  car  trusts  in  1886,  not  to  men- 
tion a  score  of  other  less  important  instances,  produced 
in  the  years  immediately  following  an  almost  absolute 
stoppage  of  the  issue  of  what  had  seemed  previously  a 
very  promising  and  important  form  of  investanent  or 
speculation. 

We  are  safe  in  concluding  that  the  rate  of  formation 
of  large  industrial  companies  will  be  less  rapid  in  the 
future  than  it  has  been  in  the  past.  Consolidations 
which  have  been  formed  for  selling  securities  by  deceiv- 
ing investors  will  cease.  But  there  will  always  remain 
a  considerable  number  which  are  formed  for  industrial 
rather  than  financial  purposes ;  and  these  will  probably 
be  more  important  twenty  years  hence  than  they  are 
to-day.  As  the  world  moves  on,  the  relative  economy 
of  large  concerns  makes  itseK  more  clearly  known.  The 
steady  movement  in  this  direction  is  not  confined  to  the 
United  States.  It  is  just  as  strongly  felt  in  England ;  it 
is,  if  possible,  even  more  strongly  felt  in  Germany.  If 
less  is  said  about  these  industrial  consoUdations  in  Europe 
than  in  America,  it  is  because  they  have  proceeded  more 
quietly  and  along  more  legitimate  lines,  not  because  they 
are  fewer  or  less  important.  They  have  not  advertised 
themselves  so  extensively,  because  they  were  not  trying 
to  sell  their  securities.  This  has  prevented  the  public 
from  knowing  so  much  about  them.     It  has  kept  them 

39 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

in  some  measure  out  of  the  market.  But  so  far  from 
interfering  with  their  prominence  in  the  actual  operation 
of  manufacture,  it  has  rather  contributed  to  increase  it. 

The  nature  of  the  economy  which  is  realized  by  these 
combinations  has  been  set  forth  by  so  many  writers  that 
we  can  pass  over  this  phase  of  the  subject  very  quickly. 
Their  advantage  is  twofold.  In  the  first  place,  the  con- 
solidation of  aU  competing  concerns  avoids  many  un- 
necessary expenses  of  distribution.  Under  the  old  system 
these  expenses  are  very  great.  The  multiplication  of 
selling  agencies  involves  much  waste.  Competitive  ad- 
vertisement is  often  an  unnecessary  and  unprofitable  use 
of  money.  Delivery  of  goods  from  independent  produ- 
cers, whether  by  wagon  or  by  railroad,  often  costs  more 
than  the  better-organized  shipments  of  a  large  single  con- 
cern. All  of  these  evils  can  be  avoided  by  consolidation. 
In  the  second  place,  a  consolidated  company  has  advan- 
tages in  its  power  of  adapting  the  amount  of  production 
to  the  needs  of  consumption.  Where  several  concerns 
with  large  plants  are  competing  and  no  one  knows  ex- 
actly what  the  others  are  doing,  we  are  apt  to  have  an 
alternation  between  years  of  over-production  and  years 
of  scarcity,  —  an  alternation  no  less  unfortunate  for  the 
public  than  for  the  parties  immediately  concerned.  A 
wisely  managed  combination  can  do  much  to  avoid  this. 
By  making  its  production  more  even  it  can  give  a  con- 
stant supply  of  goods  to  the  consumers  and  a  constant 
opportunity  of  work  to  the  laborers ;  and  the  resulting 
steadiness  of  prices  is  so  great  an  advantage  to  all  con- 
cerned that  the  public  can  well  afford  to  pay  a  very  con- 
siderable profit  to  those  whose  organizing  power  has 
rendered  such  useful  service. 

This  is  the  picture  of  the  workings  of  industrial  con- 
solidation which  is  drawn  by  its  most  zealous  defenders. 

40 


FORMATION  AND   CONTROL   OF  TRUSTS 

It  is  needless  to  say  that  it  represents  possible  rather 
than  actual  achievement ;  that  where  one  company  has 
secured  these  results,  five,  or  perhaps  ten,  have  failed  to 
secure  them ;  that  for  one  combination  which  has  earned 
large  profits  by  public  service,  many  have  tried  to  earn 
large  profits  by  pubHc  disservice,  and  have  frequently 
ended  in  loss  to  themselves  and  to  the  public  alike. 

But  as  long  as  it  is  possible  for  a  well-managed  con- 
sohdation  to  do  better  work  for  all  parties  than  could 
have  been  done  under  free  competition,  so  long  we  may 
expect  to  see  the  movement  in  this  direction  continue. 
Where  there  is  a  real  economy  to  be  achieved,  investors 
wiU  try  to  take  advantage  of  tlie  opportunity.  The 
attempt  to  prohibit  them  from  so  doing  is  likely  to 
prove  futile.  There  is  no  better  evidence  of  the  strength 
of  the  tendency  toward  consolidation  than  is  furnished 
by  the  multitude  of  unenforced  laws  and  decisions  in- 
tended to  prevent  it.  When  railroads  were  first  intro- 
duced, people's  minds  revolted  against  the  monopoly  of 
transportation  thereby  involved.  Statutes  were  devised 
to  make  the  track  free  for  the  use  of  different  carriers, 
as  the  public  highway  is  free  to  the  owners  of  different 
wagons.  But  the  economy  of  having  all  the  trains  con- 
trolled by  a  single  owner  was  so  great  that  people  were 
forced  to  abandon  their  preconceived  notion  of  public 
right  to  the  track.  They  still,  however,  tried  to  insist 
that  the  owners  of  separate  railroads  should  compete 
with  one  another,  and  passed  various  laws  to  forbid  the 
formation  of  pools  and  traffic  associations.  Some  of 
these  attempts  have  been  failures  from  the  outset; 
others  have  simply  hastened  the  process  of  consohdation 
of  the  competing  interests  which  put  them  beyond  the 
reach  of  the  special  law ;  the  few  which  have  been  ef- 
fective have  done  a  great  deal  of  harm  and  almost  no 

41 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

good.  The  majority  of  thinking  men  have  come  to  the 
conclusion  that  raikoads  are  in  some  sense  a  natural 
monopoly,  and  have  classed  them  with  water-works,  gas- 
works, and  other  "  quasi-pubhc "  lines  of  business,  as 
an  exception  to  the  general  rule  of  free  competition. 
But  we  are  now  beginning  to  find  that  the  same  possibil- 
ities of  economy  which  first  showed  themselves  in  these 
distributive  enterprises  may  be  realized  also  in  produc- 
tive industry.  They  are  felt  to  a  considerable  degree  in 
all  kinds  of  enterprise  involving  large  plant ;  and  there 
is  every  reason  to  believe  that  the  tendency  toward  com- 
bination will  be  as  inevitable  in  manufacturing  as  in 
transportation.  In  the  one  case  as  in  the  other,  we  may 
expect  that  laws  against  pools  will  contribute  to  the 
formation  of  trusts,  that  laws  against  trusts  will  lead  to 
actual  consolidation. 

On  the  other  hand,  we  need  not  expect  this  process  to 
be  a  sudden  one.  There  are  practical  limits  to  the 
economy  of  consolidation,  which  are  more  effective  than 
the  legal  ones.  The  difficulty  of  finding  men  to  manage 
the  largest  of  these  enterprises  constitutes  the  greatest 
bar  to  their  success.  Just  as  in  an  army  there  are  many 
who  can  fill  the  position  of  captain,  few  who  can  fill 
that  of  colonel,  and  almost  none  who  are  competent  to 
be  generals  in  command  —  so  in  industrial  enterprise 
there  are  many  men  who  can  manage  a  thousand  dollars, 
few  who  can  manage  a  million,  and  next  to  none  who 
can  manage  fifty  million.  The  mere  work  of  centrahzed 
administration  puts  a  tax  upon  the  brains  of  men  who 
are  accustomed  to  a  smaller  range  of  duties,  which  very 
few  find  themselves  able  to  bear. 

Nor  is  this  all.  The  existence  of  a  monopoly  gives 
its  managers  a  wider  range  of  questions  to  decide  than 
came  before  any  of  them  under  the  old  system  of  free 

42 


FORMATION  AND  CONTROL   OF  TRUSTS 

competition.  Where  several  concerns  are  producing  the 
same  line  of  goods  the  price  which  any  of  them  can 
charge  is  largely  fixed  by  its  competitors.  It  is  com- 
pelled to  sell  at  market  prices.  The  manager  concen- 
trates his  attention  on  economy  of  production,  so  as  to 
be  able  to  make  a  profit  at  those  prices  while  his  rival  is 
perhaps  making  a  loss.  But  when  aU  of  these  concerns 
are  consoHdated  under  a  single  hand,  the  power  of  con- 
trolling the  prices  of  the  product  is  vastly  greater.  The 
manager  no  longer  asks  at  what  rate  others  are  selling ; 
he  asks  what  the  market  will  bear.  To  answer  this 
question  intelligently  he  must  consider  the  future  de- 
velopment of  the  industry  as  well  as  the  present.  The 
discretionary  power  which  the  absence  of  competition 
places  in  his  hands  constitutes  a  temptation  to  put  prices 
up  to  a  point  injurious  to  the  public  and  ruinous  to  the 
permanence  of  the  consoHdated  company.  Our  past 
experience  with  industrial  consohdations  proves  that 
very  few  men  are  capable  of  resisting  this  temptation  or 
of  exercising  the  wider  power  over  business  which  the 
modem  system  places  in  their  hands. 

The  name  "trust,"  which  is  popularly  apphed  to  all 
these  large  aggregations  of  capital,  was  somewhat  acci- 
dental in  its  origin.  It  has,  however,  an  appropriateness 
which  few  persons  reaHze.  The  managers  of  every  con- 
soUdated  enterprise,  whether  based  on  a  contract,  a  trust 
agreement,  or  an  actual  consolidation,  are  exercising  pow- 
ers to  benefit  or  injure  the  pubhc  which  are  analogous 
to  those  of  a  trustee.  It  has  been  said  that  all  property 
is,  in  its  wider  sense,  a  trust  in  behalf  of  the  consumer. 
But  where  competition  is  active,  the  power  of  using  wrong 
business  methods  and  unfair  prices  is  so  far  limited  that 
the  chance  for  abuse  of  this  trust  is  greatly  lessened.  It 
is  only  in  the  case  of  large  combinations,  with  their  dis- 

43 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

cretionary  power  for  good  or  evil,  that  the  character  of 
the  trust  reposed  by  society  in  the  directors  of  its  busi- 
ness enterprise  makes  itself  reaUy  and  truly  felt.  With 
these  trusts,  as  with  every  other  trust  that  deserves  the 
name,  it  is  hard  to  provide  legislative  machinery  which 
will  absolutely  secure  its  fulfilment.  The  ability  to 
handle  any  trust  is  the  result  of  a  long  process  of  legal 
and  moral  education.  We  cannot  make  a  law  which 
shall  allow  the  right  exercise  of  a  discretionary  power 
and  prohibit  its  wrong  exercise.  But  it  is  possible  to 
modify  the  existing  law  in  a  great  many  directions, 
which  wiU  hasten  instead  of  retarding  the  educational 
process.  Thus  far  most  of  our  statutory  regulations 
have  been  in  the  wrong  direction.  We  have  attempted  to 
prohibit  the  inevitable,  and  have  simply  favored  the  use 
of  underhanded  and  short-sighted  methods  of  doing 
things  which  must  be  done  openly  if  they  are  to  be  done 
well. 

To  make  matters  move  in  the  right  direction,  at  least 
three  points  must  be  kept  in  view. 

1.  Increased  responsibility  on  the  part  of  hoards  of 
directors. 

Where  the  members  of  a  board  are  working  for  their 
own  individual  purposes,  ignoring  or  even  antagonizing 
the  permanent  interests  of  the  investors,  all  the  evils  of 
industrial  combination  are  likely  to  be  seen  at  their 
worst,  and  the  possibility  of  improvement  is  reduced  to 
a  minimum. 

In  the  first  place,  the  mere  fact  that  the  directors  are 
allowed  to  ignore  their  narrower  and  clearer  duties  to 
the  investors  prevents  them  from  recognizing  the  very 
existence  of  their  wider  duties  to  the  public.  They 
think  of  business  as  a  game,  which  they  play  under  cer- 
tain well-defined  rules.     They  sacrifice  those  whom  they 

44 


FORMATION  AND   CONTROL   OF  TRUSTS 

represent  in  order  to  win  the  game  for  themselves. 
This  wrong  underlying  idea  prevents  them  from  rightly 
conceiving  of  any  trust  which  they  may  handle. 

In  the  next  place,  the  temporary  interests  which  the 
directors  pursue  in  endeavoring  to  manipulate  the  mar- 
ket are  not  likely  to  coincide  with  the  interests  of  the 
outside  pubhc,  whether  laborers  or  consumers.  The 
interests  of  the  speculator  may  be  furthered  by  these 
very  fluctuations  in  price  which  it  is  the  ostensible 
object  of  the  consolidation  to  avoid.  If  a  business  like 
that  of  the  Standard  OH  Company  is  run  with  a  view 
to  the  permanent  interests  of  the  public,  it  will  generally 
be  found  that  prices  are  made  relatively  low  and  steady, 
and  that  laborers  are  given  constant  employment;  but 
in  some  other  cases,  where  the  property  has  been  subject 
to  manipulation,  the  results  have  been  just  the  reverse. 

Finally  —  and  this  is  perhaps  the  most  important 
point  of  all  —  if  the  directors  are  allowed  to  make  their 
money  independently  of  the  interests  of  the  investor  and 
the  consumer,  the  education  in  poHtical  economy  which 
should  result  from  business  success  or  failure  is  done 
away  with.  If  a  man  is  managing  a  business  with  a 
full  sense  of  responsibility  to  those  who  put  money  into 
the  enterprise,  a  failure  to  serve  the  public  means,  in  the 
long  run,  a  failure  of  his  own  purposes  and  ambitions. 
If  this  failure  is  but  partial,  he  will  learn  to  do  better 
next  time ;  if  it  is  complete,  he  wiU  give  place  to  some 
one  else.  But  if  he  has  taken  up  the  industry  as  a 
temporary  speculation,  buying  the  securities  at  prices 
depressed  by  untrue  reports,  holding  for  an  increase  of 
value,  and  selling  them  on  false  pretences  to  deluded 
investors,  no  lesson  is  learned  by  the  management  of  the 
enterprise ;  and  the  same  mistakes  may  be  repeated  in- 
definitely under  successive  boards  of  directors.     Greater 

45 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

strictness  with  regard  to  the  formation  of  new  compa- 
nies,  increased  publicity  of  accounts,  clear  recognition, 
legal  and  moral,  of  the  responsibility  of  directors  who 
have  made  false  reports  to  the  stockholders,  —  these  axe 
conditions  precedent  to  any  radical  and  thorough  reform 
of  existing  abuses.^ 

2.  A  change  in  the  legal  character  of  the  labor  contract. 

Here  we  stand  on  more  doubtful  ground.  It  is  easy 
to  say  that  the  present  relations  between  large  corporar 
tions  and  their  employees  are  unsatisfactory.  It  is 
difficult  to  say  just  what  should  be  done  to  make  them 
better.  As  matters  stand  at  present,  a  strike  begun  on 
trivial  grounds  may  be  allowed  to  interrupt  the  whole 
business  of  a  community.  The  natural  alternative 
would  seem  to  be  compulsory  arbitration;  but  this  in 
practice  has  not  worked  nearly  as  well  as  could  be 
desired.  It  is  probable  that  in  this  respect  changes  in 
the  laws  must  come  slowly.  An  obligation  of  a  consoli- 
dated company  to  perform  continuous  service  must  be 
coupled  with  a  clearer  definition  of  the  obligations  of 
the  workman  in  this  respect.  Whatever  can  or  cannot 
be  done  by  legal  enactment,  society  must  at  any  rate 

^  The  real  objection  to  stock  watering  —  about  which  so  much  is  said 
and  so  little  nnderstood  —  lies  along  these  lines.  The  old-fashioned  criti- 
cism of  watered  stock  was  based  on  the  supposition  that  the  public  was 
compelled  by  the  practice  to  pay  higher  rates  than  would  otherwise 
have  been  charged.  There  may  be  a  very  few  instances  of  this  kind ;  but 
the  idea  that  such  water  has  any  considerable  general  effect  on  rates  has 
been  pretty  thoroughly  disproved.  The  rates  are  arranged  to  make  max- 
imum net  returns  above  expenses,  whether  the  nominal  capital  be  large  or 
small.  The  evil  which  really  results,  all  but  universally,  from  stock  water- 
ing is  habitual  falsification  of  accounts.  If  the  directors  so  arrange  their 
books  as  to  make  it  appear  that  money  has  been  invested  which  actually 
has  never  passed  through  their  hands,  they  are  under  a  great  temptation 
to  make  false  reports  concerning  other  parts  of  the  business,  and  to  with- 
hold from  investors  and  consumers  alike  that  sort  of  information  which 
the  public  has  a  right  to  require. 

46 


FORMATION  AND  CONTROL  OF  TRUSTS 

recognize  that  those  whom  it  has  placed  in  charge  of 
large  industrial  enterprises  are  not  simply  handling 
their  own  money  or  other  people's  money,  but  are  above 
aU  things  leaders  of  men ;  and  it  must  judge  the  finan- 
cier who  has  through  his  negligence  allowed  the  busi- 
ness of  the  community  to  be  interrupted  by  strikes,  as  it 
would  judge  the  general  who,  in  his  anxiety  to  secure 
the  emoluments  of  his  office,  had  allowed  his  country  to 
be  invaded  and  his  armies  paralyzed. 

3.  An  increased  care  in  the  imposition  of  high  import 
duties. 

In  the  past  we  have  allowed  the  manufacturers  in 
each  line  of  industry  a  great  deal  of  freedom  to  suggest 
what  the  tariff  on  the  products  of  their  foreign  competi- 
tors should  be,  knowing  that  if  it  was  placed  too  high 
the  internal  competition  of  new  enterprises  would  re- 
duce profits  and  prices  to  a  not  exorbitant  level.  Of 
course  mistakes  have  been  made  in  this  matter  which 
have  caused  serious  and  unnecessary  variations  in  price ; 
but  as  a  rule  domestic  competition  has  set  moderate 
limits  to  the  arbitrary  results  of  tariff-making.  When, 
however,  domestic  competition  is  done  away  with,  the 
danger  is  more  serious  and  permanent.  It  is  hardly 
possible  to  deal  very  directly  with  the  tariff  question 
without  going  beyond  the  limits  of  a  chapter  like  this ; 
but  it  is  safe  to  say  that  in  those  industries  which  are  at 
all  thoroughly  monopolized  public  safety  wiU  generally 
demand  that  duties  be  placed  on  a  revenue  rather  than 
a  protective  basis.  The  fact  that  an  industry  can  thus 
organize  itself  shows  that  it  has  outgrown  the  period 
of  infancy.  If  it  continues  to  demand  a  prohibitory 
tariff  on  its  products,  the  presumption  is  that  it  is 
trying  to  make  an  arbitrary  profit  at  the  expense  of 
the  consimier. 

47 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

Such  are  the  general  directions  in  which  private  cor- 
porations must  expect  increased  restriction,  as  they 
become  more  or  less  complete  monopolies.  But  there  is 
a  still  deeper  question  which  many  are  asking,  and  to 
which  not  a  few  are  giving  a  radical  answer.  Will  such 
monopolies  be  long  allowed  to  remain  in  the  hands  of 
private  corporations  at  all  ?  Is  it  not  rather  true  that 
this  consolidation  is  a  step  in  the  direction  of  state 
ownership  of  industrial  enterprise?  Is  not  a  grave 
crisis  at  hand  in  which  there  will  be  a  decisive  struggle 
between  the  forces  of  individualism  and  socialism,  of 
property  and  of  numbers? 

It  is  quite  within  the  limits  of  possibility  that  many 
of  these  enterprises  will  pass  into  government  owner- 
ship in  the  immediate  future ;  but  it  is  highly  improb- 
able that  this  tendency  toward  consolidation  is  increasing 
the  dangers  of  a  conflict  between  individualists  and 
socialists.  Its  net  effect  is  to  diminish  these  dangers  by 
making  the  question  of  state  ownership  relatively  unim- 
portant to  the  public  as  a  whole.  This  may  seem  like  a 
surprising  statement,  but  there  are  a  great  many  facts 
to  justify  it.  There  has  been  of  late  years,  in  connec- 
tion with  these  movements  toward  consolidation,  an 
approximation  in  character  between  private  and  public 
business.  Formerly  the  two  were  sharply  distinguished ; 
to-day  their  methods  are  much  closer  to  each  other. 
Private  business  can  do  little  more  than  pay  interest  on 
the  capital  involved,  because  of  the  increased  intensity 
of  modem  competition.  Public  business  can  do  no  less 
than  pay  interest  on  the  capital  involved,  because  of  the 
growing  vigilance  of  the  taxpayers;  for  the  taxpayers 
will  not  tolerate  a  deficit  which  increases  their  burdens. 
But  obviously  the  position  of  the  consumer  toward  a 
private  business  which  pays  less  than  four  per  cent  is 

48 


FORMATION  AND  CONTROL   OF  TRUSTS 

not  likely  to  be  very  different  from  his  position  toward 
a  public  business  which  must  pay  more  than  three. 
The  distinction  from  the  financial  standpoint  is  thus 
reduced  to  a  minimum;  nor  is  it  much  greater,  if  we 
look  at  the  matter  from  the  operating  standpoint.  The 
ofi&cers  of  a  large  private  corporation  have  almost  ceased 
to  come  into  direct  contact  with  the  stockholders ;  and 
to  a  nearly  equal  degree  our  public  administrative  offi- 
cials who  actually  do  the  work  have  ceased  to  come  into 
contact  with  the  voters.  The  private  officer  no  longer 
seeks  simply  to  please  the  individual  group  of  investors ; 
the  pubHc  official  no  longer  strives  simply  to  please  the 
individual  group  of  politicians.  The  man  who  does  so 
is  in  either  case  charged,  and  rightly  charged,  with  mis- 
understanding the  duties  of  his  office.  The  more  com- 
pletely the  principles  of  civil  service  reform  are  carried 
out,  the  closer  does  the  similarity  become.  The  re- 
sponsibility of  public  and  private  officials  alike  leads 
them  to  the  exercise  of  technical  skill  and  sound  general 
principles  of  business  policy,  rather  than  to  the  help  of 
influential  private  interests.  Under  these  circumstances, 
the  character  of  good  public  business  and  good  private 
business  becomes  so  nearly  alike  that  it  makes  compara- 
tively little  difference  to  most  of  us  whether  an  enter- 
prise is  conducted  by  our  voters  or  by  our  financiers. 
The  one  question  to  ask  is,  which  method  produces  in 
any  case  the  fewer  specific  abuses.  We  may  look  with 
confidence  to  the  time  when  the  question  of  state  owner- 
ship of  industrial  enterprises  will  cease  to  be  a  broad 
popular  issue,  and  become  a  business  question,  which 
economic  considerations  may  perhaps  lead  society  to 
decide  in  favor  of  public  control  at  one  point  and 
private  control  at  some  closely  related  point.  There 
will,  of  course,  always  be  a  conflict  between  those  who 
4  49 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

have  more  money  than  votes,  who  will  desire  to  extend 
the  sphere  of  commercial  activity,  and  those  who  have 
more  votes  than  money,  who  will  desire  to  extend  the 
sphere  of  political  activity ;  but  to  the  great  majority  of 
people,  who  have  one  vote  and  just  money  enough  to 
support  their  families,  it  is  not  probable  that  this 
conflict  will  ever  create  a  general  issue  of  the  first 
importance. 

We  may  sum  up  our  general  conclusions  as  follows : 
So  far  as  the  present  tendency  toward  industrial  consoli- 
dation is  a  financial  movement  for  the  sake  of  selling 
securities,  it  is  hkely  to  be  short-lived.  So  far  as  it  is 
an  industrial  movement  to  secure  economy  of  operation 
and  commercial  policy,  it  is  likely  to  be  permanent. 
Attempts  to  stop  this  tendency  by  law  will  probably  be 
as  futile  in  the  field  of  manufacture  as  they  have  been 
in  that  of  transportation.  The  growth  of  these  enter- 
prises creates  a  trust  in  a  sense  which  is  not  generally 
appreciated;  it  gives  their  managers  a  discretionary- 
power  to  injure  the  public  as  well  as  to  help  it.  The 
wise  exercise  of  this  trust  cannot  be  directly  provided 
for  by  legal  enactment;  it  must  be  the  result  of  an 
educational  process  which  can  be  furthered  by  widened 
conceptions  of  directors'  responsibility.  As  this  process 
of  consolidation  and  of  education  goes  on,  private  and 
public  business  tend  to  approach  one  another  in  charac- 
ter. The  question  of  state  ownership  of  industrial 
enterprises,  instead  of  becoming  an  acute  national  issue, 
as  so  many  now  expect,  will  tend  rather  to  become 
relatively  unimportant,  and  may  not  improbably  be 
removed  altogether  from  the  field  of  party  politics. 


50 


SOCIALISM  AND   SOCIAL  REFORM 

There  is  a  set  of  current  conceptions  as  to  the  rela- 
tions between  political  economy,  socialism,  and  legisla- 
tive reform  which  have  been  fostered  by  writers  like 
Carlyle  or  Ruskin,  Kingsley  or  Maurice,  which  are 
reflected  in  many  of  the  most  popular  novels  and 
sermons  of  the  day,  and  to  which  some  economists  of 
reputation  have  more  or  less  inadvertently  lent  the 
weight  of  their  authority.  These  conceptions  may  be 
formulated  as  follows:  — 

1.  Political  Economy  makes  the  individual  an  end, 
in  and  for  himself;  in  other  words,  it  is  a  gospel  of 
Mammon  and  a  glorification  of  selfishness. 

2.  Socialism  substitutes  collective  aims  for  individual 
ones.  It  is  the  result  of  a  moral  reaction  against  the 
traditional  political  economy,  —  a  reaction  which  is  tak- 
ing hold  of  the  masses,  and  which  they  are  inclined  to 
carry  to  an  extreme. 

3.  The  only  way  to  prevent  matters  from  being  car- 
ried to  such  an  extreme  is  for  the  wealthy  and  intelli- 
gent classes  to  adopt  a  great  many  socialistic  measures 
on  their  own  account,  before  the  control  of  our  social 
machinery  is  taken  out  of  their  hands. 

The  first  of  these  conceptions  is  an  entire  mistake. 
Political  Economy  does  not  regard  the  individual  as  an 
end  in  himself.  It  does  not  glorify  the  pursuit  of  wealth 
except  so  far  as   this  pursuit  serves  the  interests  of 

51 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

society  as  a  whole.  The  great  work  of  Adam  Smith 
was  an  inquiry  into  the  causes  of  the  wealth  of  nations; 
and  subsequent  economists  have  followed  in  his  foot- 
steps. They  have  shown  that  the  collective  prosperity 
of  a  people  is  far  better  fostered  by  the  individual 
freedom  and  enlightened  self-interest  of  its  members 
than  by  any  comphcated  system  of  police  government. 
They  have  shown  that,  in  the  industry  of  modern  civi- 
lized nations,  the  man  who  serves  himself  intelligently 
is  generally  serving  others,  even  when  he  has  no  inten- 
tion or  consciousness  of  so  doing.  But  in  all  this  the 
individual  freedom  is  treated  as  a  means  to  social  wel- 
fare rather  than  as  an  end  in  itself. 

This  development  of  individualism  in  economics  is 
part  of  the  general  trend  of  modern  thought  and  modem 
life.  A  few  centuries  ago,  the  principle  of  individual 
freedom  was  not  recognized  in  law  or  in  morals,  any 
more  than  in  trade.  It  was  then  thought  that  liberty 
in  trade  meant  avarice,  that  liberty  in  politics  meant 
violence,  and  that  liberty  in  morals  meant  blasphemous 
wickedness.  But  as  time  went  on,  the  modern  world 
began  to  see  that  this  old  view  was  a  mistake.  Human 
nature  was  better  than  had  been  thought.  Man  was 
not  in  a  state  of  war  with  his  Creator  and  all  his  fellow- 
men  which  it  required  the  combined  power  of  the 
church  and  the  police  to  repress.  When  a  community 
had  achieved  political  freedom  its  members  on  the 
whole  used  that  freedom  to  help  one  another  instead 
of  to  hurt  one  another.  When  it  had  achieved  moral 
freedom,  it  substituted  an  enlightened  and  progressive 
morality  for  an  antiquated  and  formal  one.  When  it 
had  achieved  industrial  freedom,  it  substituted  high 
efficiency  of  labor  for  low  efficiency,  and  large  schemes 
of  mutual  service  for  small  ones.     Constitutional  liberty 

62 


SOCIALISM  AND  SOCIAL  REFORM 

in  politics,  rational  altruism  in  morals,  and  modern  busi- 
ness methods  in  production  and  distribution  of  wealth, 
have  been  the  outcome  of  the  great  individualistic 
movement  of  the  nineteenth  century. 

The  Bishop  of  Durham's  statement  that  "  individu- 
alism regards  humanity  as  made  up  of  disconnected  or 
warring  atoms  "  is  not  merely  imtrue ;  it  is  exactly  the 
reverse  of  the  truth.  This  idea  of  disconnected  and 
warring  atoms  represents  the  traditional  standpoint 
instead  of  the  modern  individualistic  one.  The  indi- 
vidualist holds  that,  as  society  develops,  the  interests 
of  its  members  become  more  and  more  harmonious; 
in  other  words,  that  rational  egoism  and  rational  altru- 
ism tend  to  coincide.  In  fact  his  chief  danger  lies  in 
exaggerating  the  completeness  of  this  coincidence  in 
the  existing  imperfect  stage  of  human  development,  and 
in  believing  that  freedom  will  do  everything  for  society, 
economically  and  morally. 

These  mistakes  and  exaggerations  of  individualism 
have  given  a  legitimate  field  for  socialistic  criticism, 
both  in  morals  and  in  economics.  Some  of  the  ablest 
economists  on  both  sides  of  the  Atlantic  have  done 
admirable  work  in  pointing  out  where  the  evils  arising 
from  individual  freedom  may  exceed  its  advantages,  and 
when  society  must  use  its  collective  authority  to  pro- 
duce the  best  economic  and  moral  results.  Such  has 
been  the  work  of  John  Stuart  Mill,  of  Stanley  Jevons, 
of  Sir  Thomas  Farrer,  of  President  Andrews,  and  of  the 
leaders  of  the  German  "  Historical  School."  Men  of 
this  type  recognize  that  the  point  of  issue  between  them 
and  their  opponents  is  not  a  question  of  ends,  but  of 
means.  Both  sides  have  the  same  object  at  heart ; 
namely,  the  general  good  of  society.  One  side  believes 
that  this  good  is  best  achieved  by  individual  freedom 

43 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

in  a  particular  line  of  action;  the  other  side  believes 
that  the  dangers  and  evils  with  which  such  freedom 
is  attended  outweigh  its  advantages.  The  good  and 
evil  are  often  so  closely  balanced  that  economists  on 
either  side  find  the  utmost  advantage  in  studying  the 
criticisms  of  their  opponents  as  a  means  of  avoiding 
or  correcting  their  own  errors. 

But  the  name  "  socialist "  is  rarely  applied  to  a  critic 
of  this  stamp.  It  belongs  by  current  usage  to  a  far 
larger  body  of  people  who  dislike,  misunderstand,  and 
try  to  ignore  the  results  of  economic  experience.  They 
are,  as  a  rule,  men  who  see  clearly  the  existence  of  cer- 
tain evils  in  modem  industrial  society  which  some  econ- 
omists have  overlooked,  and  others  have  deplored  as 
inevitable.  They  rush  to  the  conclusion  that  economic 
science  regards  these  evils  with  indifference,  and  that  its 
conclusions  and  purposes  are  therefore  immoral;  while 
they  claim  for  themselves,  more  or  less  consciously,  a 
superior  moral  purpose  because  they  are  trying  to  right 
visible  wrongs  by  direct  state  activity.  This  is  no 
unfair  account  of  a  reaction  against  the  teachings  of 
economics,  which  is  now  widespread  and  which  is 
thought  by  its  exponents  to  be  animated  by  a  high  moral 
purpose. 

In  actual  fact,  the  reaction  is  not  so  much  a  moral  as 
an  emotional  one.  It  is  not  an  indication  that  the  social- 
ist hates  moral  evils  which  the  economist  of  the  old 
school  regards  with  apathy.  It  is  rather  the  result  of  a 
difference  in  mental  constitution  which  leads  the  econo- 
mist to  calculate  the  large  and  remote  consequences  of 
any  measure  and  ignore  the  immediate  details,  while  the 
socialist  feels  the  details  so  strongly  that  he  refuses  to 
work  out  the  indirect  consequences  of  his  action.  It  is 
an  old  saying  that  men  may  be  divided  into  two  classes, 

54 


SOCIALISM  AND  SOCIAL  REFORM 

one  of  which  is  so  occupied  looking  at  the  woods  that  it 
does  not  see  the  trees,  while  the  other  is  so  occupied 
with  the  trees  that  it  does  not  see  the  woods.  The  atti- 
tude of  some  of  the  economists  toward  questions  of 
social  reform  is  not  inaptly  typified  by  the  former  class ; 
that  of  their  socialistic  critics  by  the  latter. 

Of  course  it  will  not  do  to  undervalue  the  emotional 
element  in  dealing  with  economic  matters,  as  men  of  the 
more  purely  intellectual  type  are  sometimes  prone  to  do. 
Reasoning  about  human  conduct  is  full  of  chances  of 
error ;  and  if  the  outcome  of  such  reasoning  is  to  leave  a 
considerable  number  of  human  beings  in  hopeless  misery, 
society  is  justified  in  demanding  that  every  premise  and 
every  inference  in  the  chain  of  reasoning  be  tested,  and 
every  rational  experiment  be  made  to  see  whether  such  a 
consequence  is  reaUy  inevitable.  Instances  have  not 
been  wanting  when  the  conclusions  of  the  economists 
have  proved  wrong,  and  the  emotions  of  the  critics  have 
been  warranted  by  the  event.  The  factory  legislation  of 
England  furnishes  an  historic  example.  The  economists, 
as  a  rule,  condemned  this  legislation  as  wrong  in  prin- 
ciple and  likely  to  do  harm ;  but  the  results  showed  that 
these  economists  had  overlooked  certain  factors  of  im- 
portance with  regard  to  public  health  and  public  morals 
which  vitiated  their  conclusions  and  justified  public 
opinion  in  disregarding  them. 

But  while  the  men  of  emotion  may  sometimes  be  right 
and  the  men  of  reason  wrong,  the  chances  in  matters  of 
legislation  are  most  decidedly  the  other  way.  It  is  safe 
to  say  that  the  harm  which  has  been  done  by  laws  based 
on  unemotional  reasoning  is  but  a  drop  in  the  bucket 
compared  with  that  which  has  been  done  by  laws  based 
on  unreasoning  emotion.  The  tendency  to  overvalue 
feeling  as  compared  with  reason  is  a  far  greater  danger 

65 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

than  the  tendency  to  undervalue  it.  Legislation  is  esseor 
tially  a  matter  of  remote  consequences.  The  man  who 
tries  to  reason  out  these  consequences  will  occasionally 
make  mistakes;  the  man  who  refuses  to  reason  them 
out  will  habitually  do  so.  The  good  which  state  inter- 
ference does  is  often  something  visible  and  tangible. 
The  evil  which  it  does  is  much  more  indirect,  and  can 
only  be  appreciated  by  careful  study.  The  man  who  has 
his  mind  so  fixed  on  some  immediate  object  as  to  shut 
his  eyes  to  the  results  of  such  study,  is  almost  certain  to 
advocate  too  much  state  action.  He  may  succeed  in 
passing  a  few  good  laws,  but  he  will  be  responsible  for  a 
vastly  larger  number  of  bad  ones. 

The  danger  from  this  source  is  increased  by  the  fact 
that  so  many  good  people  make  very  little  distinction 
between  what  is  emotional  and  what  is  moral.  They 
think  that  calculated  conduct  is  selfish  conduct,  and  that 
unselfishness  can  exist  only  in  the  emotional  as  opposed 
to  the  intellectual  sphere.  Many  a  man  gives  charity  to 
a  pauper  upon  impulse  and  thinks  he  is  doing  a  good 
deed,  when  he  is  reaUy  shutting  his  eyes  to  the  conse- 
quences of  an  evil  one.  "  Virtue,"  says  a  French  writer, 
"is  more  dangerous  than  vice  because  its  excesses  are 
not  subject  to  the  restraints  of  conscience."  There  is  a 
great  deal  of  legislation,  and  a  great  deal  of  socialism,  to 
which  this  remark  will  apply.  Its  promoters  believe 
themselves  to  be  actuated  by  moral  ideas,  when  the 
chief  ground  for  this  belief  is  the  absence  of  intellectual 
ones. 

Perhaps  the  most  plausible  argimient  urged  in  favor  of 
the  superior  morality  of  the  socialistic  system  is  that  it 
would  teach  people  to  think  more  than  they  now  do  of 
sympathy  as  an  industrial  force,  and  less  of  self-interest. 
It  is  urged  that  a  belief  in  the  principles  of  the  commer- 


SOCIALISM  AND  SOCIAL  REFORM 

cial  world  tends  to  make  people  selfish,  while  a  belief  in 
socialism  tends  to  make  them  sjnnpathetic.  This  view 
is  hardly  justified  by  the  facts  of  history.  In  Europe, 
all  through  the  Middle  Ages,  charity  was  regarded  as  a 
right  and  business  as  a  wrong;  but  those  ages  were 
marked  by  strife  rather  than  by  sympathy.  The  attempt 
to  restrict  business  transactions  and  to  suppress  self- 
interest  as  a  commercial  factor  stood  in  the  way  of 
mutual  service.  The  assertion  of  the  duty  of  charity 
did  not  produce  a  better  system  of  social  relations,  as 
some  of  its  advocates  would  have  us  believe.  It  put 
intolerable  burdens  upon  some  classes  —  especially  the 
agricultural  laborers  —  in  order  to  support  other  classes 
in  comparative  idleness.  Though  the  ideals  of  socialism 
may  be  attractive,  its  methods  have  been  demoralizing; 
and  this  is  the  really  important  thing  to  consider  in 
judging  the  moral  character  of  socialism  as  an  economic 
system. 

Let  us  compare  the  moral  effect  of  the  commercial  and 
the  sociaHstic  theories  of  value.  The  commercial  theory 
is  that  the  value  or  proper  price  of  an  article  is  based  on 
the  needs  of  the  market;  that  is,  upon  the  utUity  of 
additional  supplies  of  that  article  to  the  consumers. 
The  sociahsts  object  that  the  results  of  this  theory  are 
unjust,  and  that  some  people  get  a  large  price  for  what 
has  cost  them  very  little  effort ;  while  others  expend  a 
great  deal  of  effort  and  can  command  only  a  small  price 
in  return.  They  would  have  us  adopt  a  theory  of  value 
which  should  make  the  price  depend  on  the  sacrifice  of 
the  producer  rather  than  on  the  needs  of  the  consumer. 
At  first  sight  the  socialistic  theory  seems  the  more  just ; 
and  the  emotional  man  is  pretty  certain  to  pronounce  it 
morally  superior  to  the  commercial  theory.  But  the  in- 
tellectual man,  who  traces  the  conseq^uences  of  the  two 

67 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

views,  finds  that  the  commercial  theory  leads  men  to 
produce  what  others  want  in.  as  large  quantities  as  possi- 
ble, and  with  the  minimum  expenditure  of  labor ;  whUe 
the  socialistic  theory  leads  men  to  spend  as  many  hours 
as  possible  over  their  work  and  dole  out  the  smallest 
possible  quantities  of  what  other  people  want.  What- 
ever may  be  thought  of  the  assumptions  of  the  two  sys- 
tems, the  industrial  results  of  the  commercial  theory  are 
efficiency,  progress,  and  service  to  others;  while  those 
of  the  socialistic  theory  are  inefficiency,  antiquated 
methods  of  work,  and  restriction  of  service  rendered. 

Judged  in  the  light  of  economic  history,  the  "high 
ideals  "  which,  to  quote  the  words  of  a  somewhat  over- 
sympathetic  observer,  "  socialism  has  placed  before  the 
masses  of  the  people,  and  which  they  have  absorbed," 
are  based  partly  on  erroneous  assumptions  and  partly 
on  demoralizing  ones. 

But  there  is  still  another  point  to  be  considered.  Even 
if  we  regard  the  socialistic  views  as  erroneous  and  de- 
moralizing, the  fact  remains  that  they  are  held  to  a 
greater  or  less  extent  by  a  large  number  of  people  — 
perhaps  a  majority  of  the  voters  in  the  United  States. 
What  is  a  wise  man  to  do  under  these  circumstances? 
Shall  he  make  concessions  to  this  sentiment  lest  a  worse 
thing  befall  him?  Some  economists  of  high  standing 
explicitly  urge  that  this  should  be  done.  From  this 
view  the  writer  is  compelled  to  dissent  emphatically, 
alike  on  grounds  of  morality  and  of  pohcy.  He  believes 
that  the  courageous  answer  to  this  question  is  the  pru- 
dent one,  and  that  that  answer  is.  No. 

Let  us  not  be  misunderstood.  If,  on  careful  inquiry, 
it  appears  to  a  thinking  man  that  the  public  good  will 
in  any  particular  case  be  better  served  by  the  adoption 
of  socialistic  means  rather  than  of  individualistic  ones, 

58 


SOCIALISM  AND  SOCIAL  REFORM 

he  ought  to  favor  their  adoption,  whether  this  policy 
commands  five  votes  or  five  million.  But  if  he  does  not 
believe  that  the  public  good  will  be  served  by  such  a 
policy,  and  nevertheless  lends  his  countenance  to  its 
adoption  because  he  is  afraid  to  oppose  the  emotional 
demand  which  stands  behind  it,  his  conduct  is  a  mis- 
take from  whatsoever  point  of  view  we  regard  it. 

In  the  first  place,  it  is  likely  to  strengthen  rather  than 
weaken  the  demand  for  more  radical  changes.  You  can- 
not compromise  with  an  emotion  as  you  can  with  a  dif- 
fering opinion,  —  witness  the  difficulties  of  arbitration 
in  labor  disputes.  An  emotion  is  stimulated  rather  than 
satisfied  by  concessions.  Such  concessions  are  taken  as 
evidence,  not  of  a  spirit  of  accommodation,  but  of  weak- 
ness, —  and,  on  the  whole,  rightly  so.  If  the  conserva- 
tives yield  to  a  popular  clamor  which  overawes  but  does 
not  convince  them,  the  people  are  justified  in  assuming 
that  their  previous  toleration  of  evils  was  due  to  indif- 
ference and  not  to  an  honest  conviction  that  it  was  im- 
possible to  stop  them  by  state  action.  In  sacrificing 
their  own  better  judgment,  the  conservatives  give  up 
their  strongest  weapon  of  defence,  and  gain  absolutely 
nothing. 

Nor  do  we  find,  except  in  rare  instances,  that  the 
failure  of  an  experiment  in  over-legislation  lessens  the 
demand  for  similar  action  in  the  future.  The  failure 
will  be  attributed  not  to  the  fact  that  there  was  too 
much  state  action,  but  too  little.  Disasters  and  losses 
connected  with  state  railroad  control  are  made  so  many 
arguments  in  favor  of  state  railroad  ownership.  The 
difficulties  and  failures  of  co-operation  under  the  exist- 
ing system  of  industry  lead  to  a  demand  for  a  "co- 
operative commonwealth."  No  socialistic  experiment 
is  proved  a  failure,  in  the  eyes  of  its  promoters,  until 

59 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

all  other  simultaneous  experiments  have  been  stopped. 
It  is  just  here  that  individualism  has  its  greatest  ad- 
vantage for  the  progress  of  the  community.  It  tries  to 
leave  people  free  to  make  their  OAvn  mistakes ;  trusting 
that  the  successful  experiment  will  be  followed  and  the 
unsuccessful  one  abandoned,  and  that  the  community 
will  thereby  profit  from  the  errors  hardly  less  than  from 
the  successes  of  its  active  members.  Though  this  ideal 
of  the  individualist  is  nowhere  fully  carried  out,  it  is 
imquestionably  true  that  economic  individualism  has  en- 
abled nations  to  learn  and  profit  by  the  success  or  failure 
of  industrial  experiments  far  more  rapidly  than  any  so- 
cialistic system  with  the  collective  action  which  it  neces- 
sitated. The  world's  great  inventions  and  improvements, 
material  and  moral,  have  been  made  by  individual  initia- 
tive, and  adopted  reluctantly  by  organized  governments 
of  any  form  whatever.  Individualism  is  educational 
and  progressive;  socialism  in  the  majority  of  cases  is 
not.  That  education  which  a  socialist  government  seeks 
to  foster,  represents  the  wisdom  of  the  present  rather 
than  the  possibilities  of  the  future.  Measured  by  its 
success  in  securing  these  possibilities,  sociahsm,  whether 
in  economics,  in  politics,  or  in  morals,  falls  short  of  that 
system  of  liberty  of  which  men  like  Mill  and  Morley 
have  been  the  champions.  Such  writers  do  not  deny 
that  individual  liberty  permits  grave  mistakes  which 
centralized  authority  would  avoid.  They  defend  the 
great  principle  that  each  man  should  be  free  to  make 
his  own  mistakes  in  that  group  of  actions  which  is  char- 
acterized as  "  self-regarding,"  not  because  such  mistakes 
are  few  in  nimiber,  but  because  their  repression  involves 
a  repression  of  the  best  possibilities  of  good.  They 
would  leave  all  possible  ways  open  to  the  reformer,  be- 
cause Qo  man  knows  by  which  way  he  will  come.    Is 


SOCIALISM  AND  SOCIAL  REFORM 

Morley's  expressive  language,  they  refuse  to  root  out 
the  tares,  not  because  they  thereby  leave  the  wheat  a 
better  chance  to  grow,  but  because  "there  are  in  the 
great  seed-plot  of  human  nature  a  thousand  rudimentary 
germs,  not  wheat  and  not  tares,  of  whose  properties  w^ 
have  not  had  a  fair  opportunity  to  assure  ourselves ;  and 
if  you  are  too  eager  to  pluck  up  the  tares,  you  pluck  up 
with  them  untried  possibilities  of  human  excellence." 

These  are  the  reasons  why  the  system  of  the  indi- 
vidualist has  given  fuller  opportunities  than  that  of 
the  socialist  for  the  development  of  progressive  men 
and  methods.  It  is  because  of  this  success  in  serving 
the  community  that  individuahstic  economics  holds  the 
position  which  it  does  at  the  present  day.  It  is  not 
because  the  leaders  of  industry  or  the  exponents  of 
the  traditional  pohtical  economy  are  popular,  for  they 
are  not.  It  is  because  their  work  proves  constructive 
and  preservative  of  human  happiness,  while  that  of  their 
opponents  is  unsuccessful  or  destructive.  It  is  doubt- 
ful whether  President  Cleveland  at  the  time  of  the 
Chicago  labor  troubles  was  any  more  popular  than 
President  Debs;  but  President  Cleveland  represented 
intellect,  while  President  Debs  represented  emotion, 
and  we  know  what  came  of  the  contest.  A  nation 
must  let  intellect  rule  over  emotion,  whether  it  likes 
intellect  or  not.  The  alternative  is  political  and  in- 
dustrial suicide.  The  proof  of  intellect  and  the  con- 
dition of  holding  power  is  success  in  foreseeing  the 
future.  "There  is  one  quality  in  a  general  which 
every  soldier  understands,  and  that  is  success." 

Whenever  a  repubhc  undertakes  to  carry  on  a  war, 
there  is  always  a  popular  demand  for  more  vigorous 
action  than  the  judgment  of  the  best  trained  officers  can 
approve.     An  emotional  public  sentiment  mistakes  the 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

caution  of  a  general  for  apathy,  and  stigmatizes  his  scien- 
tific foresight  as  the  result  of  cowardice  or  treachery. 
Too  often,  under  the  influences  of  such  a  sentiment,  a 
Fabius  is  displaced  by  a  Varro,  a  McClellan  by  a  Pope, 
or  a  Johnston  by  a  Hood.  A  Gates  is  allowed  to  snatch 
away  the  well-earned  laurels  of  a  Schuyler,  and  even  to 
menace  the  authority  of  a  Washington.  But  sooner  or 
later  science  finds  its  vindication  in  a  Cannse  or  a  Cam- 
den, a  Manassas  or  an  Atlanta.  It  is  not  by  yielding  to 
popular  demands,  as  did  Burnside  at  Fredericksburg  or 
Lee  at  Gettysburg,  that  generals  preserve  their  authority 
and  their  cause.  It  was  a  great  deed  when  Thomas  held 
his  position  at  Chickamauga  for  hour  after  hour  against 
the  assaults  of  ever-increasing  numbers,  amid  imminent 
peril  of  destruction;  but  it  was  a  far  greater  deed  for 
himself  and  for  the  Union,  when,  fifteen  months  later, 
he  held  his  position  at  Nashville,  week  after  week, 
under  increasing  popular  clamor  for  premature  action, 
and  in  the  hourly  peril  of  ignominious  removal.  The 
statesman  who,  under  the  pressure  of  popular  clamor, 
modifies  his  calmer  scientific  judgment  to  suit  an  emo- 
tional demand,  barters  the  possibility  of  a  Nashville  for 
the  probability  of  a  Fredericksburg. 

This  illustration  will  serve  to  show  why  economists 
as  a  body  look  with  distrust  on  those  who  appeal  from 
the  conclusions  of  history  and  deduction  to  those  of 
popular  sentiment,  and  will  explain  a  great  deal  of  their 
alleged  intolerance  and  exclusiveness.  It  is  not  true 
that  economists  make  the  individual  good  an  end  in 
itself.  Nothing  but  ignorance  of  their  writings  can 
excuse  this  belief.  Nor  is  it  true  that  they  reject  social- 
istic means  for  the  promotion  of  the  public  welfare. 
Those  who  adopt  an  extreme  position  in  this  matter  are 
to-day  in  an  insignificant  minority.     But  they  strongly 

62 


SOCIALISM  AND  SOCIAL  REFORM 

disapprove  the  attempt  to  "  popularize "  economics  by- 
giving  too  much  weight  to  the  conclusions  of  unin- 
structed  public  sentiment.  It  is  not  toward  the  theories 
of  the  socialists  that  their  hostility  is  exercised,  nor 
even  toward  their  practical  proposals,  but  toward  their 
methods  of  investigation  and  the  manner  of  their  appeal 
to  the  public.  For  nothing  can  be  more  fatal  to  that 
efficiency  of  public  opinion  on  which  all  good  govern- 
ment rests,  than  the  habit  of  fixing  our  eyes  on  imme- 
diate consequences  instead  of  permanent  causes,  or  of 
giving  to  the  emotions  of  a  body  of  witnesses  the 
dignity  of  the  dehberate  judgment  of  a  court. 


63 


THE  RELATION  BETWEEN  ECONOMICS 
AND  POLITICS 

In  some  respects  economic  science  is  now  at  the  height 
of  its  prosperity.  At  no  previous  period  has  popular 
interest  in  the  subject  been  so  widespread.  Our  college 
class  rooms  are  thronged  with  its  students.  Teachers 
in  our  secondary  schools  are  striving  to  find  a  place  for 
it  in  their  curricula.  For  public  lecturers  in  this  domain 
the  demand  far  outruns  the  supply.  Editors  of  all  our 
leading  journals  seek  for  writers  educated  in  pohtical 
economy.  Large  business  corporations  demand  expert 
statisticians  for  aid  in  the  solution  of  their  most  diffi- 
cult problems.  In  education,  in  journalism,  or  in  finance, 
the  trained  economist  to-day  finds  a  great  and  growing 
demand  for  his  services. 

But  in  one  vital  respect  the  conditions  are  far  less 
satisfactory.  The  influence  of  our  economists  on  gov- 
ernment and  legislation  is  not  only  less  than  it  should 
be  to-day,  but  less  than  it  many  times  has  been  in  the 
past.  Our  practical  politicians,  good  as  well  as  bad, 
have  for  the  most  part  an  ill-concealed  contempt  for 
a  class  of  men  whom  they  regard  as  theorists  and  vision- 
aries. In  individual  cases  they  sometimes  ask  the 
advice  of  economists,  and  —  more  rarely  —  take  it ;  but 
they  are  far  from  having  the  habit  of  asking  or  tak- 
ing such  advice  as  an  incident  to  the  working  of 
government  machinery.     The  application  of  civil  service 

64 


ECONOMICS  AND  POLITICS 

examinations  and  other  improved  methods  of  filling 
administrative  offices  has  not  mended  matters  in  this 
respect.  Rather  has  it  emphasized  the  lack  of  influence 
of  economic  science  on  governmental  practice ;  for  it 
has  filled  our  public  service  with  men  technically  trained 
in  almost  every  branch  of  knowledge  except  economics. 
I  am  not  indeed  unmindful  of  the  valuable  work  which 
has  been  done  and  is  being  done  by  our  American  econo- 
mists on  problems  of  currency  and  taxation,  on  price 
statistics,  on  railroad  statistics,  and  other  subjects  of 
public  moment.  We  have  no  small  number  of  trained 
men  who  are  ready  and  able  to  do  good  public  service 
in  these  matters.  But  the  very  excellence  of  their  work 
only  emphasizes  the  contrast  between  the  subordinate 
position  and  precarious  influence  which  is  to-day  accorded 
them,  and  the  commanding  places  attained  by  economists 
of  the  earlier  generation.  Where  can  we  find  among 
our  younger  men  those  who  are  succeeding  to  the  inheri- 
tance of  Walker  and  Wells,  of  Charles  Francis  Adams 
and  Horace  White  ?  One  of  these  economists  was  given 
scope  for  his  powers  as  superintendent  of  the  census; 
another,  as  commissioner  of  the  revenue.  The  record 
of  their  work  has  passed  into  history;  it  is  a  history 
of  scientific  study  and  practical  influence  combined 
which  reads  almost  like  romance  when  contrasted  with 
some  of  the  administrative  methods  of  the  present  day. 
The  third  of  these  men,  as  a  Massachusetts  public 
official,  created  a  system  of  railroad  regulation  which, 
whatever  its  deficiencies,  has  nevertheless  left  its  impress 
on  the  law  of  a  whole  continent ;  the  fourth  has  proved 
himself  the  mightiest  champion  of  the  cause  of  sound 
public  finance  in  the  country,  and  has  made  the  journal 
which  he  edits  second  to  none  in  the  world  as  a  power 
for  influencing  public  opinion  and  public  action.  Where 
8  65 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

shall  we  look  for  their  successors?  We  are  learning 
more  about  the  theory  of  utility  than  did  our  fathers ; 
but  Eire  we  doing  so  much  for  the  realization  of  that 
theory  in  the  organized  life  of  the  nation? 

If  the  economists  fail  in  their  influence  upon  public 
life,  they  fail  in  what  is  the  most  important  appUcation  of 
their  studies,  and  in  what  may  almost  be  said  to  consti- 
tute their  fundamental  reason  for  existence.  Even  if 
such  failure  be  only  temporary,  as  I  believe  it  is,  it 
furnishes  nevertheless  a  most  serious  matter  for  con- 
sideration. Let  us  strive  just  now,  if  we  may,  to  get 
some  light  on  this  phase  of  economic  history.  Let  us 
see  why  economics  and  politics  have  grown  apart  in  the 
immediate  past,  and  consider  whether  there  is  any  hope 
for  their  reunion  in  the  immediate  future. 

Our  work  naturally  divides  itself  into  two  parts.  We 
must  first  acquaint  ourselves  with  the  history  of  eco- 
nomics, and  note  the  changed  conceptions  of  economic 
study  which  have  successively  developed.  We  must 
next  do  the  same  thing  with  politics,  and  note  the 
changes  which  have  taken  place  both  in  its  underlying 
ideas  and  in  the  method  of  applying  them. 

It  is  hardly  necessary  to  say  that  the  conception  of 
economics  has  fluctuated  widely  from  age  to  age,  and 
tliat  the  sphere  of  economic  study  has  altered  corre- 
spondingly. The  history  of  this  science,  like  that  of 
so  many  others,  begins  with  Aristotle.  In  his  mind  the 
relations  between  economics  and  politics  were  simple. 
Economics  meant  to  him  the  art  of  ordering  the  affairs 
of  a  household,  politics  the  art  of  ordering  the  affairs 
of  a  state.  Each  had  its  own  clearly  defined  field  of 
inquiry.  The  two  subjects  had  indeed  points  of  simi- 
larity ;  a  man  who  was  familiar  with  the  one  was  better 
prepared  thereby  to  deal  with  the  other;    but  funda- 

66 


ECONOMICS  AND  POLITICS 

mentally  their  spheres  were  as  distinct  as  those  of  geog- 
raphy and  astronomy.  As  a  part  and  a  subordinate  part 
of  the  science  of  economics,  Aristotle  was  forced  to 
notice  the  more  unworthy  science  or  rather  art  of  chre- 
matistics,  —  the  science  or  art  of  making  money.  It  is 
notorious  that  Aristotle  looked  upon  this  part  of  the 
subject  with  disapproval.  His  idea  of  business  was  like 
that  of  Mr.  Caleb  Garth  in  Middlemarch,  to  whom  it 
"  never  meant  money  transactions,  but  the  skilful  appli- 
cation of  labor."  But  in  the  minds  of  Aristotle's  suc- 
cessors the  subject  of  money  and  money-making  assumed 
constantly  increasing  importance  in  the  study  of  private 
economy.  This  was  in  fact  an  almost  necessary  conse- 
quence of  substituting  the  labor  of  freemen  for  the 
labor  of  slaves.  If  the  householder  was  able  to  obtain 
labor  by  physical  compulsion,  he  could  despise  money 
and  all  things  connected  therewith;  but  if  he  had  to 
buy  his  labor,  he  was  forced  to  pay  attention  to  the 
means  of  buying  it.  Thomas  Aquinas  had  no  more 
love  for  money-getting  than  had  Aristotle ;  but  the 
social  conditions  of  the  time  of  Thomas  Aquinas 
rendered  it  necessary  to  take  more  account  of  money- 
getting  than  did  the  social  conditions  of  the  time 
of  Aristotle.  It  was  also  gradually  seen  that  money 
economy  formed  a  better  means  of  public  service  than 
the  older  system  of  slave  labor.  Interest,  at  first  unrea- 
sonably condemned  by  economic  moralists,  was  after- 
wards tolerated  and  ultimately  defended.  In  the  middle 
of  the  seventeenth  century  the  term  "  economy  "  had 
come  to  be  associated  almost  exclusively  with  the  work 
of  money-getting.  More  than  this,  the  principles  of 
chrematistics,  or  of  economy  in  its  modern  sense,  were 
applied  to  the  conduct  of  public  affairs,  and  gave  rise 
to  the  study  of  political  economy,  in  which  ideas  derived 

67 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

from  the  study  of  private  business  were  transferred  to 
the  work  of  the  statesman.  The  cameralists^  applied 
the  methods  of  domestic  economy  to  matters  of  public 
finance,  —  the  conduct  of  the  business  affairs  of  the  gov- 
ernment. The  mercantihsts  went  yet  farther,  and  tried 
to  apply  these  same  methods  to  the  international  com- 
merce of  the  whole  people.  In  other  words,  they  pro- 
claimed the  duty  of  the  statesman  to  assist  his  people  as 
well  as  his  government  in  making  money.  At  the  end 
of  the  seventeenth  century  political  economy  was  uni- 
versally understood  as  an  attempt  to  apply  the  princi- 
ples of  money-getting  to  the  conduct  of  national  affairs ; 
and  with  this  practice  in  view,  it  was  assiduously  studied 
by  financiers  and  by  statesmen. 

The  eighteenth  and  nineteenth  centuries  have  wit- 
nessed a  reaction.  It  began  with  the  French  physiocrats, 
who  protested  against  the  aims  of  the  mercantilists; 
combating  the  idea  that  national  wealth  could  best 
be  subserved  by  national  money-making;  contending 
that  the  food  of  the  people  rather  than  the  gold  or  silver 
in  circulation  measured  the  national  prosperity.  It  was 
carried  still  further  by  their  English  successors,  who 
criticised  the  means  adopted  by  the  mercantilists  no  less 
than  their  aims;  showing  how  individual  freedom  con- 
duced to  the  development  of  public  wealth,  in  many 
cases  at  any  rate,  far  more  surely  than  did  legislative 
activity.  A  new  conception  of  political  economy  thus 
arose,  with  higher  aims  and  broader  foundations  than 
the  old.  It  is  hardly  necessary  to  say  that  the  gain, 
both  in  scientific  truth  and  in  practical  utility,  was  very 
great  indeed.  It  is  perhaps  more  necessary  to  point  out 
some  of  the  dangers  which  attended  the  realization  of 
this  gain. 

1  Students  of  camtralia,  affairs  of  the  exchequer. 
68 


ECONOMICS  AND  POLITICS 

In  the  first  place,  there  was  often  a  loss  of  concrete- 
ness.  The  older  political  economy  expressed  its  results 
in  pounds,  shillings,  and  pence.  They  might  be  true  or 
they  might  be  false,  but  they  were  at  any  rate  embodied 
in  a  form  which  was  capable  of  measurement  and  verifi- 
cation. Not  without  good  cause  did  the  mercantihsts 
claim  for  their  reasonings  the  title  of  "pohtical  arith- 
metic." We  may  apply  to  them  the  words,  at  once 
appreciative  and  critical,  which  Bagehot  applied  to 
George  Cornewall  Lewis :  "  Of  course  he  was  not  uni- 
formly right,  —  there  were  some  kinds  of  facts  which  he 
was  by  mental  constitution  not  able  whoUy  to  appreciate, 
—  but  his  view  of  every  subject,  though  it  might  not 
be  adequate,  was  always  lucid.  His  mind  was  like  a 
registering  machine  with  a  patent  index :  it  took  in  all 
the  data,  specified,  enumerated  them,  and  then  indicated 
with  unmistakable  precision  what  their  smn  total  of 
effect  precisely  was.  The  index  might  be  wrong;  but 
nobody  could  ever  mistake  for  a  moment  what  it  meant 
and  where  it  was."  In  this  respect  later  political  econo- 
mists are  at  a  disadvantage.  The  new  political  economy 
has  substituted  a  vaguer  conception  of  wealth  for  the 
more  concrete  one;  and  many  of  its  propositions  have 
suffered  a  corresponding  loss  of  clearness  and  precision. 
The  mercantile  school  of  economists  had  measured  wealth 
in  terms  of  money.  The  first  generation  of  their  critics 
measured  it  in  terms  of  food.  The  second  and  third 
generation  measured  it  as  "commodities."  Our  own 
generation  measures  it  in  terms  of  utility.  But  food  is 
a  less  definite  and  tangible  measure  than  money ;  com- 
modities are  a  less  definite  and  tangible  measure  than 
food ;  and  utility  is  perhaps  the  least  definite  and  tangi- 
ble measure  of  all.  People  knew  exactly  how  the  propo- 
sitions of  Sir  Thomas  Mun  applied  to  any  concrete  case ; 

69 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

they  knew  approximately  how  those  of  Turgot  applied ; 
they  can  make  a  fair  guess  how  those  of  Ricardo  or  Mill 
apply ;  but  of  the  application  of  those  of  Sax  or  Menger 
they  can  hardly  hazard  a  conjecture. 

And  in  the  second  place,  with  this  loss  of  concreteness 
of  conception  came  a  loss  of  definiteness  of  aim,  —  the 
almost  inevitable  result  of  substituting  the  principles  of 
a  science  for  the  practice  of  an  art.  This  change  was 
hardly  noticed  in  the  first  generation,  when  Turgot  and 
Smith  and  their  followers  were  chiefly  occupied  in 
sweeping  away  old  restrictions ;  but  when  it  came  to  the 
point  of  building  up  rather  than  of  pulling  down,  the 
loss  was  felt  very  strongly.  The  old  political  economy 
often  gave  wrong  advice,  but  at  the  very  worst  it  was 
explicit  and  consistent  advice.  The  new  political  econ- 
omy, in  its  anxiety  to  avoid  error,  falls  into  vagueness, 
and  into  apparent  if  not  real  inconsistency.  For  a 
presumptuous  claim  of  knowledge  it  substitutes  either 
controversies  or  confessions  of  ignorance.  Fools  pro- 
verbially rush  in  where  angels  fear  to  tread;  but  this 
difference  of  pohtical  method  has  at  times  the  unfor- 
tunate effect  of  lessening  the  practical  influence  of 
angels  upon  the  affairs  of  this  world.  As  the  art  of 
pohtical  economy  gave  place  to  the  science  of  econom- 
ics, it  was  placed  at  an  inevitable  disadvantage  in  deal- 
ing with  those  who  sought  for  the  easily  mastered  rules 
of  an  art  which  professed  to  teach  them  what  they  could 
do,  rather  than  the  general  principles  of  a  science  which 
too  often  indicated  only  what  they  could  not  do. 

This  was  not  the  fault  of  the  pohtical  economists.  It 
was  their  fault,  however,  that,  when  the  problem  of  se- 
curing practical  influence  became  harder,  they  did  not 
always  make  increased  efforts  to  render  their  points 
clear  to  the  statesman,  but  oftentimes  took  refuge  in  the 

70 


ECONOMICS  AND  POLITICS 

seclusion  of  the  schools,  and  there  built  up  theories  of 
society  more  interesting  and  profitable  to  the  scientist 
than  to  the  politician.  The  number  of  students  who 
thronged  their  lecture  rooms  increased  this  temptation. 
Instead  of  making  it  a  science  for  statesmen  they  were 
led  to  make  it  a  science  for  schoolmen,  with  all  that 
complex  terminology  which  Giddings  so  aptly  caUs  its 
jargon.  In  many  cases  this  process  has  gone  so  far  as 
to  render  economics  a  subordinate  department  of  psy- 
chology rather  than  of  politics ;  a  theory  of  motives 
starting  from  assumptions  that  are  never  realized  com- 
pletely, and  ending  in  propositions  than  can  never  be 
verified  at  all.  I  am  far  from  wishing  to  cast  ridicule 
on  metaphysical  methods  of  poKtical  economy.  Cournot 
and  Jevons  and  the  Austrian  school  have  taught  us 
a  great  many  things  that  we  did  not  know  before.  They 
have  substituted  good  underlying  metaphysics  for  bad 
underlying  metaphysics.  But  the  very  excellence  of 
this  foundation  has  tended  to  divert  attention  from  the 
superstructure,  which,  after  all,  is  the  thing  with  which 
we  have  to  deal  in  practical  life.  I  am  disposed  to  think 
seriously  that  the  excessive  use  of  psychological  terms 
and  conceptions,  to  the  neglect  of  purely  commercial  ones, 
has  been  the  most  potent  cause  to  weaken  the  influence 
of  economists  among  statesmen  and  men  of  the  world. 

Meantime  popular  notions  of  government,  and  gov- 
ernments themselves,  were  in  the  midst  of  a  process  of 
evolution  which  tended  to  carry  them  somewhat  away 
from  the  influence  of  economic  theory,  even  if  that 
theory  had  remained  the  same.  The  judiciary,  the 
legislature,  and  the  administration  were  subject  each 
of  them  to  separate  influences  which  made  them  less 
ready  to  rely  on  the  political  economist  for  advice  and 
guidance. 

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THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

It  might  be  thought  that  the  judiciary,  at  any  rate, 
would  never  have  become  independent  of  economic  con- 
siderations ;  for  the  scientific  study  of  the  law  has  had 
and  still  has  a  close  affihation  with  the  scientific  study 
of  political  economy.  This  affiliation  between  econom- 
ics and  jurisprudence  is  manifest  alike  in  their  data, 
in  their  methods,  and  their  conclusions.  The  funda- 
mental datum  of  modem  economics  is  property  right. 
This  is  also  the  datum  and  starting-point  of  a  large  part 
of  our  legal  reasoning.  The  method  of  the  economist 
is  a  combination  of  the  historical  and  the  deductive. 
He  studies  the  precedent  by  which  property  right  has 
been  established  on  the  one  hand,  and  deduces  the  con- 
sequences arising  from  such  property  rights  on  the  other 
hand.  This  combination  is  also  characteristic  of  the 
methods  of  the  judiciary;  the  chief  difference  between 
economists  and  courts  being  that  the  economist  considers 
how  the  individual  judgment  will  act  under  the  given 
conditions,  while  the  court  considers  how  the  public 
judgment  will  act.  But  this  difference  of  standpoint 
ought  not  to  lead  to  conflicting  or  even  to  inharmonious 
conclusions;  for  the  economist  shows  over  and  over 
again  how  freedom  of  individual  judgment  in  the  pur- 
suit of  its  ends  results  in  collective  good,  and  the  judi- 
ciary shows  with  equal  force  how  the  free  activity  of 
public  judgment,  in  the  pursuit  of  its  ends,  leads  to  the 
highest  measure  of  individual  good.  Finally,  the  char- 
acteristic conclusions  and  precepts  of  the  modem  politi- 
cal economists  are  summed  up  in  the  two  words  "  free 
competition ; "  and  this  is  no  less  characteristically  the 
conclusion  and  precept  of  our  law  courts.  In  relying 
on  competition  to  liberalize  commercial  practice,  econo- 
mists and  lawyers  have  gone  hand  in  hand,  sharing  in 
tolerably  equal  measure  the  glory  of  habitual  success 

72 


ECONOMICS  AND  POLITICS 

in  its  application  and  the  odium  of  occasional  error  in 
its  misapplication. 

But  economics  and  law  have  to  some  degree  parted 
company;  not  so  much  in  hostility  as  in  indifference, 
not  so  much  in  denying  one  another's  conclusions  as  in 
ignoring  them.  In  the  earlier  times  economists  and 
jurists  were  both  concerned  to  harmonize  their  conclu- 
sions with  those  of  pohtical  ethics,  and  each  science  was 
thus  brought  into  vital  connection  with  the  other.  But 
just  as  economics  gradually  assumed  the  character  of  a 
science  or  discipline  by  itself,  based  upon  the  action  of 
each  individual  in  deciding  what  was  for  his  own  utility 
—  and  making  this  exercise  of  indiAddual  judgment  an 
absolute  fact  if  not  an  absolute  right;  so  jurispru- 
dence at  almost  the  same  time  became  an  equally  ab- 
solute science,  based  upon  the  actions  of  a  public  will, 
the  judgments  of  a  sovereign  who  allowed  no  control 
except  that  which  his  own  pleasure  deigned  to  impose. 
This  doctrine  of  sovereignty  as  a  basis  of  jurisprudence 
has  a  history  closely  parallel  to  that  of  the  doctrine  of 
utility  as  a  basis  of  economics.  Until  the  end  of  the 
eighteenth  century  the  authority  of  the  law  was  based 
upon  the  supposition  of  a  social  compact.  People 
obeyed  the  government  because  the  government  ren- 
dered certain  services  to  the  people.  That  such  a  com- 
pact or  contract  ever  existed  historically  the  leading 
exponents  of  the  theory  did  not  believe  or  even  pretend 
to  believe.  Rousseau  himself  explicitly  says  that  it 
makes  no  difference  with  his  social  contract  theory, 
whether  it  had  any  historical  basis  or  not.  It  was  an 
assumption  used  to  give  vitality  and  concreteness  in 
the  conceptions  of  that  natural  justice  to  which  eigh- 
teenth-century writers  held  that  law  must  conform. 
Hobbes  and  Locke  and  Blackstone  and  Rousseau,  with 

73 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

all  their  wide  divergences  of  opinion  on  individual  points, 
were  united  in  holding  to  this  theory  of  a  compact. 
Hobbes  might  use  it  to  deny  the  right  of  revolution, 
Locke  to  prove  that  same  right ;  Blackstone  might  use 
it  as  a  conservative  force,  Rousseau  as  a  destructive 
one.  But  absolutist  and  revolutionist,  conservative 
and  radical,  all  had  before  them  the  conception  of  a 
higher  law  of  political  ethics,  limiting  the  action  of  the 
courts,  just  as  the  economists  of  the  same  period  held 
to  a  similar  conception  limiting  the  economic  action  of 
the  individual.  It  was  reserved  for  Bentham  to  deal 
the  death-blow  to  this  theory ;  to  show  not  only  that  the 
social  compact  had  no  foundation  in  history  —  which 
was  an  easy  enough  task,  because  nobody  really  thought 
it  had  —  but  also  no  foundation  in  logic ;  to  insist  that 
so-called  natural  law  was  no  law  at  all;  that  law  was 
what  the  courts  said,  just  because  the  courts  chose  to 
say  it  and  for  no  other  reason  whatever.  When  a  cer- 
tain court  objected  to  Daniel  Webster's  logic,  "  this  is 
not  law,"  "it  was  law  until  your  honor  spoke,"  was 
the  historic  reply. 

Of  the  practical  gain  in  clearness  of  legal  decisions 
resulting  from  the  acceptance  of  the  theories  of  Bentham 
there  can  be  no  dispute ;  but  it  was  a  gain  which  has 
been  purchased  at  a  very  serious  cost.  The  courts  have 
been  estopped  from  talking  no  small  amount  of  non- 
sense; but  they  have  also  lost  no  small  part  of  their 
educational  influence  which  they  had  under  the  old 
system.  For  Bentham  may  be  said  to  have  overthrown 
a  theory  which  was  historically  false  and  prophetically 
true,  and  substituted  one  which  was  historically  true 
and  prophetically  false.  Things  have  been  law,  not  be- 
cause they  were  just  or  even  logical,  but  because  the 
courts  enunciated  them.     But  it  is  safe  to  prophesy  that 

74 


ECONOMICS  AND  POLITICS 

this  state  of  things  will  continue  only  so  long  as  the 
courts  are  respected  by  the  public  as  being  at  once  just 
and  logical.  It  is  right  as  well  as  convenient  for  the 
lawyer  to  assume  that  whatever  the  courts  conunand 
will  be  law;  but  only  because  the  courts  show  them- 
selves clearer-sighted  than  the  body  of  the  nation.  The 
authority  of  the  Enghsh  courts,  while  nominally  derived 
from  the  crown,  has  been  practically  derived  from  their 
own  good  sense  and  progressiveness.  A  theory  which 
leads  them  to  rely  more  on  precedent  and  less  on  good 
sense  and  progressiveness,  while  it  may  prevent  the  more 
commonplace  judges  from  making  an  exhibition  of  them- 
selves, nevertheless  offers  a  serious  bar  to  the  develop- 
ment of  legal  authority  to  meet  new  circumstances  and 
new  emergencies;  not  to  speak  of  the  possibility  that 
it  may  at  times  menace  the  general  respect  for  the  judi- 
ciary and  general  authority  of  the  law  as  a  whole.  As 
a  matter  of  fact,  the  courts  have  made  themselves  in- 
dependent of  the  help  of  the  economists,  by  withdraw- 
ing from  the  consideration  of  those  distinctively  modern 
problems  where  precedent  furnishes  no  clear  guide  for 
action.  In  making  the  corpus  juris  clearer  and  more 
consistent  with  itself,  it  would  seem  to  a  layman  as  if 
the  courts  have  sometimes  fallen  short  of  meeting  the 
needs  of  growing  industrial  communities.  Contrast  the 
rapid  progress  of  English  law  down  to  the  middle  of 
the  last  century  in  all  economic  matters,  where  judges 
were  among  the  most  enlightened  of  reformers,  with  its 
extremely  slow  development  in  the  face  of  modern  con- 
ditions. Take  the  subject  of  taxation.  Have  judicial 
decisions  adapted  themselves  to  facts?  No.  They  are 
based  on  assumptions  as  to  the  possibility  of  assessment 
of  personal  property  which  may  have  been  approximately 
true  in  the  eighteenth  century,  but  which  are  totally 

75 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

false  in  the  nineteenth.  The  courts,  while  protesting 
against  unequal  taxation,  nevertheless  refuse  to  look  at 
the  chief  practical  source  of  inequality,  that  source  not 
having  been  a  thing  of  great  importance  a  hundred 
years  ago.  Or  take  the  matter  of  transportation.  For 
a  generation  and  more  our  courts  insisted  on  applying 
to  the  railroad  the  precedents  derived  from  the  highway. 
It  is  not  so  very  many  years  since  they  refused  to  enter 
upon  the  most  important  of  all  railroad  rate  evils,  the 
evil  of  discrimination,  —  saying  explicitly  that  if  one 
man's  rate  was  reasonable  in  itself  it  was  irrelevant  to 
inquire  whether  another  man  was  charged  a  lower  rate. 
Such  instances  of  lack  of  attention  to  modern  facts 
might  be  multiplied  indefinitely ;  but  these  are  enough 
to  show  the  bad  effect  of  allowing  crude  attention  to 
axioms  and  precedents  to  take  the  place  of  intelligent 
discussion  of  economic  effects.  It  is  a  grave  misfor- 
tune for  the  public  when  the  legal  theory  of  sovereignty 
of  the  court  and  the  economic  theory  of  sovereignty  of 
the  individual  result  in  separating  from  one  another  and 
from  the  needs  of  practical  politics  two  sciences  whose 
best  work  has  been  done  hand  in  hand  with  each  other, 
and  in  the  most  sedulous  application  to  those  needs. 

The  consequences  of  this  separation  have  been  so 
serious  that  efforts  have  been  made  to  reintroduce  a  con- 
nection by  means  of  "  coromissions  "  of  various  forms ; 
railroad  commissions,  tax  conunissions,  labor  commis- 
sions, and  an  indefinite  niunber  of  others.  Such  bodies, 
it  is  thought,  will,  like  the  courts,  represent  public 
opinion ;  but  unlike  the  courts  they  wiU  be  possessed  of 
technical  knowledge  which  will  enable  them  to  look  for- 
ward to  the  future  and  not  merely  backward  at  the  past. 
On  the  work  of  these  commissions  as  a  whole,  there  is 
no  need  of  passing  judgment  or  balancing  their  good 

76 


ECONOMICS  AND  POLITICS 

and  their  evil.  Suffice  it  to  say  that  they  have  too 
often  proved  a  wholly  extraneous  element  in  the  de- 
velopment of  the  law,  and  that  in  assuming  quasi- 
judicial  functions  they  have  antagonized  the  courts 
instead  of  helping  them.  As  a  matter  of  constitutional 
law,  the  attempt  to  supplement  courts  by  commissions, 
involving  as  it  does  a  separation  of  the  progressive  from 
the  conservative,  of  the  technically  instructed  from  the 
legally  instructed,  is  questionable  in  principle  and  hkely 
to  produce  conflicts  in  practice.  As  a  matter  of  politi- 
cal experience,  I  think  it  is  safe  to  say  that  technically 
trained  commissions  have  proved  themselves  more  valu- 
able as  assistants  to  the  legislature  or  the  administration 
than  as  supplements  to  the  activity  of  the  courts. 

But  why  did  not  this  conservatism  of  the  judiciary 
give  the  economists  all  the  greater  opportunity  to  influ- 
ence the  legislature,  either  directly  or  indirectly?  If 
the  courts  became  the  exponents  of  precedent,  why  could 
not  Parliaments,  with  the  assistance  of  just  such  com- 
missions as  have  been  described,  be  the  champions  of 
progress?  Was  there  not  here  a  field  for  the  activity 
of  economic  experts  who,  seeing  farther  than  their  fel- 
lows, could  give  advice  which  should  be  followed  and 
should  stand  ?  As  economists  lost  the  chance  to  influ- 
ence judicial  decisions,  were  they  not  face  to  face  with  a 
wider  field  for  influencing  legislative  debates  ? 

For  the  better  part  of  a  century  this  possibility  existed. 
In  fact  it  may  be  said  to  have  lasted  nearly  as  long  as 
legislative  debate  itself  lasted.  But  the  days  of  legisla- 
tive debate  are  numbered,  if  they  are  not  already  ended. 
Congresses  and  Parhaments  have  been  compelled  to 
abandon  their  watchword  of  free  speech,  and  to  adopt 
in  one  form  or  another  the  principle  of  closure.  The 
system  of  representative  government,  devised  originally 

77 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

as  a  check  upon  the  executive,  and  admirable  as  a  means 
for  giving  free  discussion  to  measures  of  a  more  or  less 
independent  administration,  has  not  proved  equally  suc- 
cessful as  a  means  of  shaping  actual  business  in  its 
initiatory  stages.  "Armies,"  says  Macaulay,  "have 
won  victories  under  bad  generals,  but  no  army  ever  won 
a  victory  under  a  debating  society."  For  the  practical 
conduct  of  public  business  the  legislature  is  at  once  an 
unwieldy  and  an  irresponsible  body.  It  is  so,  in  the  first 
place,  on  account  of  its  niunbers.  When  the  object  of  a 
Parliament  was  to  form  and  impress  public  opinion,  a 
large  body  of  members  was  indispensable ;  but  when  the 
object  is  to  manage  the  actual  business  of  government 
intelhgentiy,  numbers  are  a  hindrance  rather  than  a  help. 
The  difficulty  is  heightened  by  the  prevalence  of  the 
bicameral  system.  When  the  object  was  the  creation 
of  public  sentiment,  two  houses  secured  twice  as  much 
publicity  as  one ;  but  when  the  object  is  despatch  of  pub- 
lic business,  two  houses  result  in  divided  responsibility, 
with  all  the  consequent  delay  and  chicane.  And  finally, 
the  system  of  district  representation,  at  first  admirable  as 
a  means  of  giving  influence  to  all  the  different  sections 
of  the  community,  becomes  under  present  conditions  a 
positive  disadvantage.  In  the  creation  of  public  senti- 
ment, it  gave  us  exchange  of  opinions ;  in  the  despatch 
of  public  business  it  means  exchange  of  favors.  Instead 
of  co-operation  in  the  general  interests  we  have  log-roUing 
for  particular  interests.  Under  the  current  system  of 
pohtical  ethics  there  is  in  fact  a  direct  antagonism 
between  the  theory  of  economics  and  the  practical 
working  of  representative  government.  The  economist 
shows  how  largely  the  independent  action  of  the  parts 
may  be  made  to  conduce  to  the  collective  good  of  the 
whole.    The  practical  working  of  representative  govem- 

78 


ECONOMICS  AND  POLITICS 

ment,  making  each  member  primarily  responsible  to  bis 
district  —  or  one  might  better  say  to  the  members  of  his 
own  party  in  his  district  —  means  that  the  collective  ac- 
tion of  the  whole  is  made  a  tool  to  subserve  the  sepa- 
rate wants  of  the  parts,  even  though  the  satisfaction 
of  those  wants  may  antagonize  the  general  interest  of 
the  nation.  The  history  of  every  tariff  bill  and  of  every 
river  and  harbor  bill  affords  illustrations  of  this  ten- 
dency of  our  representative  system.  The  economist  is 
at  a  disadvantage  in  influencing  members  of  the  legisla- 
ture, because  his  ends  are  different  from  theirs.  He  is 
trying  to  pursue  collective  interests ;  they  are  trying  — 
and  under  the  existing  condition  of  tilings,  necessarily 
trying  —  to  balance,  to  compromise,  or  in  some  fashion 
to  reconcile  divergent  ones. 

This  difference  of  aims,  which  puts  the  economist  at 
a  disadvantage  in  deahng  with  the  legislature,  ought 
apparently  to  put  him  at  a  corresponding  advantage  in 
advising  the  executive.  For  the  head  of  the  executive 
department,  be  he  wise  or  unwise,  disinterested  or  self- 
seeking,  nevertheless  regards  himself  as  a  representative 
of  the  whole  people  rather  than  of  small  sections  of  the 
people.  It  would  seem  that  such  an  executive,  on 
whom  the  nation  relies  for  progress  in  the  face  of 
judicial  conservatism  and  for  wise  collective  action  in 
the  face  of  legislative  particularism,  would  feel  more 
than  ever  the  need  of  advice  from  trained  economists  to 
guide  him  in  the  work  of  administration.  That  such 
need  exists  and  is  felt  is  unquestionably  true;  and 
where  the  administration  has  power  to  carry  out  a 
poHcy  of  its  own  the  advice  of  economic  experts  is 
habitually  sought  and  frequently  followed.  But  it  is 
not  always  the  case  that  the  administration  has  this 
power  to  carry  out  a  policy  of  its  own.     For  centuries 

79 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

we  have  been  busy  devising  constitutional  checks  of  the 
royal  prerogative.  We  have  had  so  much  reason  to 
fear  usurpations  of  power  on  the  part  of  the  executive, 
that  we  have  not  left  him  with  that  modicum  of  power 
which  is  needed  for  good  government.  If  he  has  to 
face  an  adverse  majority  in  the  legislature,  he  is  tied 
hand  and  foot.  Even  when  his  own  party  is  in  con- 
trol he  must  consult  the  representatives  of  the  various 
districts  and  pay  the  price  which  they  exact  for  sup- 
porting his  measures ;  and  he  is  too  often  reduced  to  the 
yet  more  questionable  expedient  of  seeking  assurance  of 
his  renomination  and  re-election  in  order  to  have  time  to 
give  his  policy  a  fair  trial.  Under  such  circumstances 
he  is  repeatedly  compelled  to  be  a  politician  first  and  a 
statesman  afterward.  However  much  he  may  desire 
the  advice  of  economists  and  even  avail  himself  of  their 
services,  he  is  often  divested  of  the  power  to  utilize 
them;  and  it  too  frequently  happens  that  the  econo- 
mists, in  their  encouragement  of  independent  voting  on 
each  national  issue  as  it  arises,  deprive  themselves  of 
that  influence  within  the  party  councils  which  is  neces- 
sary for  carrying  any  issue  whatsoever  to  its  logical  test 
and  conclusion. 

But  things  are  by  no  means  as  bad  as  they  recently 
have  been.  On  the  contrary,  if  we  compare  the  condi^ 
tions  of  to-day  with  those  of  twenty  years  ago,  we  see 
in  some  places  a  very  marked  increase  of  economic  meth- 
ods and  economic  influence  in  the  work  of  government. 
Particularly  true  is  this  in  municipal  affairs.  It  was 
there  that  the  need  for  a  good  business  administration 
came  most  directly  home  to  the  citizens.  It  is  there  that 
councilmen  and  aldermen  have  suffered  restrictions  of 
their  power  and  that  real  authority  has  been  given  to  the 
executive.     It  is  there  that  the  credit  for  good  business 

80 


ECONOMICS  AND  POLITICS 

management  and  the  discredit  for  bad  business  manage- 
ment can  be  most  clearly  brought  home  to  the  offi- 
cial with  whom  it  belongs.  It  is  there,  also,  that  the 
advice  of  economic  experts  counts  for  most.  It  is  not 
an  accident  that  so  much  of  the  careful  study  of  prob- 
lems of  finance  and  administration  is  to-day  dealing  with 
matters  of  municipal  government ;  it  is  a  consequence  of 
that  increased  centralization  of  administrative  power 
which  gives  the  expert  a  fair  chance.  But  the  reform 
is  not  likely  to  stop  at  that  point.  Whatever  we  may 
think  of  imperialism  as  a  sentiment  or  of  national  expan- 
sion as  a  policy  —  and  I  was  one  of  those  who  looked 
upon  their  hurried  adoption  with  regret  —  these  are 
things  to  which  we  are  already  committed.  This  policy 
brings  new  problems  of  administration  upon  us  as  a 
nation,  and  renders  it  more  necessary  than  before  to 
study  the  art  of  national  government.  When  we  were 
only  governing  ourselves  we  could  leave  Congress  to 
make  what  laws  it  pleased,  and  trust  to  the  good  sense 
and  political  education  of  the  American  people  to  pre- 
vent irreparable  damage.  But  we  now  have  to  deal  with 
peoples  who  have  not  this  good  sense  and  this  political 
education.  More  than  that,  we  have  to  deal  with  them 
in  the  sight  of  aU  the  world,  and  in  the  face  of  hostile 
powers  who  will  be  only  too  ready  to  make  our  mis- 
government  a  pretext  for  interference.  We  can  no 
longer  content  ourselves  with  the  laxness  of  method 
which  has  characterized  our  dealings  with  the  inhabitants 
of  our  western  territories. 

The  need  of  an  efficient  army  will  of  itself  make  it  nec- 
essary to  give  more  independence  to  the  administration 
and  more  opportunity  to  its  expert  advisers.  The  need 
for  a  government  of  our  new  colonies  which  shall  recog- 
nize the  principle  of  trusteeship  rather  than  of  spoHation 
6  81 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

must  conduce  yet  more  strongly  toward  the  same  results. 
The  need  of  increased  public  revenue  to  meet  our  larger 
administrative  expenditures  will  render  it  indispensable 
to  subordinate  the  demands  of  the  several  districts  to  the 
general  necessities  of  the  country.  With  no  colonies 
and  a  small  army  we  could  do  what  we  pleased  with  our 
revenue  bills.  With  larger  possessions  and  larger  neces- 
sities for  defence,  they  must  be  framed  by  a  responsible 
administration  on  a  sound  economic  basis. 

Just  how  this  change  of  governmental  methods  will 
come  about  no  one  can  venture  to  predict.  That  we 
shall  adopt  the  Enghsh  system  of  cabinet  responsibihty 
seems  unlikely;  but  that  we  shall  adopt  some  system 
which  will  cause  the  different  branches  of  our  govern- 
ment to  operate  harmoniously  is  a  foregone  conclusion. 
The  alternative  is  national  disgrace,  if  not  national  ruin. 
Here  is  the  opportunity  for  the  younger  economists  of 
the  country.  If  their  study  is  worth  anything  it  will 
give  them  a  broader  range  of  data  on  which  to  work  and 
a  clearer  perception  of  consequences  for  the  future.  It 
will  put  them  in  a  position  of  advB,ntage  in  giving  advice. 
The  more  responsible  the  government  the  more  certain 
is  it  to  take  such  advice.  I  do  not  say  that  the  oppor- 
tunity to  become  advisers  and  leaders  of  national  pohcy 
should  be  sought  by  economists  as  their  sole  duty,  or  to 
the  neglect  of  their  other  public  responsibihties.  I  do 
not  undervalue  for  a  moment  the  importance  of  economic 
theory.  I  have  the  highest  conception  of  the  work  of 
our  economists  as  teachers  of  science.  But  I  believe  that 
their  largest  opportunity  in  the  immediate  future  lies  not 
in  theories  but  in  practice,  not  with  students  but  with 
statesmen,  not  in  the  education  of  individual  citizens, 
however  widespread  and  salutary,  but  in  the  leadership 
of  an  organized  body  politic. 

82 


ECONOMIC   THEORY  AND  POLITICAL 
MORALITY 

In  the  preceding  paper,  attention  was  called  to  the 
fact  that  economists  do  not  now  exert  in  the  world  of 
politics  and  legislation  that  influence  which  ought  prop- 
erly to  belong  to  them;  and  certain  means  were  indi- 
cated, which,  if  used,  would  make  their  political  power 
greater  than  it  is  at  present.  With  regard  to  the  fact  of 
inadequate  influence,  there  is  Uttle  room  for  difference 
of  opinion.  The  economists'  lack  of  touch  with  the 
practical  affairs  of  government  is  universally  felt.  But 
with  regard  to  the  means  by  which  they  can  recover  this 
touch,  now  so  nearly  lost,  there  is  far  more  diversity 
of  view.  Not  a  few  of  our  American  economists 
hold  different,  and  to  some  degree  antagonistic,  ideas 
with  regard  to  the  means  to  be  pursued  in  order  to  in- 
crease the  influence  of  economic  science  on  modem 
pohtical  hfe.  The  present  paper  is  an  attempt  to  weigh, 
as  carefully  as  possible,  these  divergent  views  with 
regard  to  the  methods  which  "the  scholar  in  politics" 
may  properly  pursue.  It  is  an  endeavor  to  expand  more 
fully  the  argument  on  those  points  in  the  previous  dis- 
cussion where  the  members  of  the  American  Economic 
Association  have  felt  themselves  most  doubtful. 

It  has  been  well  said  that  modern  political  economy 
contains  two  distinct  parts,  —  often  inextricably  inter- 
mingled in  fact,   yet  always   separate  in  principle,  — 

83 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

a  theory  of  distribution  and  a  theory  of  prosperity. 
The  theory  of  distribution  shows  how  the  public  wealth 
is  divided  among  the  different  members  of  the  commun- 
ity. It  shows  the  effects  of  a  system  of  laws  or  a  group 
of  conunercial  conditions  on  the  relative  well-being  of 
the  different  classes  concerned.  It  tries  to  predict  how 
changes  in  those  laws  or  conditions  will  increase  the 
material  comfort  of  some  individuals  and  diminish  that 
of  others.  The  theory  of  prosperity,  on  the  other  hand, 
is  occupied  primarily  with  the  good  or  evil  of  the  nation 
as  a  whole.  It  deals  with  aggregate  results  rather  than 
with  individual  ones,  and  concerns  itself  with  the  sepa- 
rate parts  only  as  they  must  be  studied  in  order  to 
understand  this  aggregate  effect. 

The  distinction  between  these  two  sets  of  theories  is 
not  quite  the  same  as  that  between  "  static  "  and  "  dy- 
namic "  economics  of  which  we  now  hear  so  much.  It 
more  nearly  coincides  with  the  old  antithesis  between 
deductive  and  historical  schools  of  economic  study.  It 
may  perhaps  fairly  be  said  to  be  an  accurate  statement 
of  a  distinction  for  which  the  earlier  members  of  the  his- 
torical school  were  feeling,  but  which  they  failed  to  grasp 
or  formulate  in  precise  fashion,  —  a  failure  which  reacted 
seriously  upon  the  influence  of  this  school  in  matters  of 
economic  controversy.  Be  this  as  it  may,  the  distinction 
is  a  real  and  permanent  one.  Men  may  agree  absolutely 
in  their  theories  of  distribution  and  disagree  toto  calo  in 
their  theories  of  prosperity.  Marx  in  his  theory  of  dis- 
tribution followed  Ricardo  implicitly ;  in  his  theory  of 
prosperity  he  differed  from  him  at  every  point.  It  was 
just  because  he  accepted  so  thoroughly  one  part  of  the 
Ricardian  economics  that  he  was  able  to  dissent  so  con- 
sistently from  the  other,  with  a  directness  of  opposition 
bom   of  mutual   understanding.     It  was  because  each 

84 


ECONOMIC  THEORY  AND  POLITICAL  MORALITY 

assumed  so  fully  the  existence  of  free  competition,  and 

carried  out  that  assumption  so  completely  to  certain  of 

its  logical  consequences,  that  this  same  power  became  a 

demigod  to  the  one  and  a  demon  to  the  other.     In  the 

words  of  the  poet :  — 

"  Both  read  the  same  books,  day  and  night, 
But  thou  read'st  black  where  I  read  white." 

As  far  as  a  man's  political  economy  takes  the  form  of 
a  theory  of  distribution,  it  is  not  sure  to  be  very  closely 
connected  with  his  ethical  principles,  or  even  with  his 
poUtical  ones.  In  framing  such  a  theory  he  is  occupied 
with  tracing  consequences  from  observed  facts.  His 
pohtical  antecedents  or  his  ethical  prepossessions  may 
lead  him  to  observe  some  facts  more  closely  than  others, 
or  to  examine  one  part  of  his  chain  of  reasoning  more 
critically  than  another  part.  But  these  variations,  as 
far  as  they  exist,  are  errors,  even  from  the  man's  own 
standpoint,  —  errors  which  he  is  interested  in  correcting 
as  soon  as  they  can  be  brought  clearly  home  to  him. 
He  can  say,  in  the  words  of  Dunoyer,  "  Je  n'impose  rien, 
je  ne  propose  meme  rien :  f  expose,"  —  I  offer  neither  im- 
positions nor  propositions,  but  expositions.  Nor  do  his 
theories  of  distribution  modify  his  ethics  much  more 
than  his  ethics  modify  his  theories  of  distribution ;  ex- 
cept, perhaps,  so  far  as  the  habitual  assumption  of  a  set 
of  facts  and  laws  leads  to  the  habitual  assumption  of  the 
Tightness  of  those  laws,  morally  as  well  as  intellectually. 

On  the  other  hand,  a  man's  theory  of  prosperity  is 
closely  interwoven  with  his  theories  of  ethics  and  of 
politics.  Moral  and  political  standards  are  a  determin- 
ing element  in  our  judgment  as  to  whether  a  nation's 
aggregate  condition  is  good  or  bad.  The  habit  of  mak- 
ing historical  generalizations  as  to  national  welfare  has 
very  important  effects  upon  our  moral  and  political  judg- 
ed. 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

ments  as  to  the  ordinary  affairs  of  life.  It  is  at  this 
point  that  the  interaction  between  economics  and  poli- 
tics, whether  by  way  of  mutual  aid  or  mutual  criticism, 
is  most  constant.  Only  occasionally  and  incidentally 
do  our  theories  of  distribution  lead  us  to  intervene  in 
political  affairs  by  showing  that  certain  lines  of  legis- 
lation produce  different  results  from  those  which  are 
contemplated.  Daily  and  hourly  does  our  theory  of 
prosperity  lead  us  to  such  intervention,  when  we  believe 
that  the  aims  of  a  certain  group  of  moralists  or  pohti- 
cians  are  destructive  to  the  well-being  of  the  nation  as 
a  whole. 

Just  at  this  point,  where  the  possibility  of  influence 
is  greatest,  the  difficulty  which  meets  the  economist 
who  strives  to  maintain  a  dispassionate  and  critical  atti- 
tude is  also  keenest.  In  his  theory  of  distribution  he 
can  readily  remain  a  passive  observer  of  facts.  He  can 
measure  and  weigh  the  results  of  competition,  as  he  can 
measure  and  weigh  the  results  of  gravitation  or  of  bio- 
logical selection ;  and  he  can  guard  himself  against  error 
in  fact  or  deduction  by  the  same  methods  which  are 
used  by  the  physicist  or  the  biologist  for  the  same 
purpose.  But  when  he  comes  to  measure  the  aggregate 
merit  of  the  total  result,  he  has  a  different  task  and 
a  far  harder  one. 

It  was  the  underlying  assumption  of  the  preceding 
paper  that  even  in  this  hard  task  the  scientific  knowl- 
edge possessed  by  the  economist  enables  him  to  come 
nearer  to  its  fulfilment  than  can  his  fellow  members 
of  the  community;  that  in  this  field  of  exceptional 
doubt  he  should  undertake  to  realize  the  noblest  ideals 
as  a  scientific  man  who  stands  above  the  clouds  of  preju- 
dice, and  therefore  sees  farther  than  those  about  him; 
that  it  is  his  high  mission  to  be  the  representative  and 

86 


ECONOMIC   THEORY  AND  POLITICAL  MORALITY 

the  champion  of  the  pennanent  interests  of  the  whole 
community,  in  the  face  of  conflicting  claims  from  repre- 
sentatives of  temporary  or  partial  ones. 

This  view  of  the  mission  and  the  duties  of  the  politi- 
cal economist  has  been  challenged  on  three  grounds : 
as  bad  psychology,  bad  politics,  and  bad  ethics. 

We  are  told,  in  the  first  place,  as  a  matter  of  practical 
psychology,  that  no  man  can  make  his  judgment  as  to 
national  well-being  independent  of  his  social  antecedents 
and  his  ethical  training.  If  he  has  grown  up  among 
soldiers,  he  will  have  one  set  of  standards ;  if  he  has 
grown  up  among  business  men,  he  will  have  a  second; 
if  he  has  grown  up  among  literary  men,  he  will  have 
a  third ;  if  he  has  grown  up  among  laborers,  he  will  have 
a  fourth.  Strive  as  he  may  to  dissociate  himself  from 
effects  of  education  and  environment,  he  can  at  best  be 
but  partially  successful.  His  political  vision  suffers  not 
only  from  near-sightedness,  but  from  astigmatism.  The 
former  he  may  perhaps  correct;  no  power  on  earth  can 
enable  him  to  correct  the  latter,  or  even  to  gain  an 
objective  estimate  of  its  influence  upon  his  observations. 
Robert  Malthus  was  a  disinterested  man,  and  so  was 
Henry  George;  yet  in  neither  case  was  such  disin- 
terestedness sufficient  to  protect  them  from  obliquities 
of  moral  vision  which  led  to  diametrically  opposite  con- 
clusions as  to  the  conditions  of  public  prosperity.  A 
man  may  have  the  intention  to  be  impartial,  and  may 
be  perfectly  candid  in  the  belief  that  he  has  carried  out 
this  intention;  but  that  only  makes  matters  worse, 
because  this  delusion  prevents  him  from  recognizing 
the  need  of  applying  outside  correctives  to  his  judg- 
ment, and  often  leads  him  to  impugn  the  fairness  of 
anybody  else  who  suggests  such  correctives.  Why  not, 
under  these  circumstances,  admit  freely  the  difficulty 

87 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

under  which  we  labor  in  making  objective  judgments? 
Why  not  recognize  from  the  first  that  each  of  us  repre- 
sents a  locality  or  a  class,  and  that  the  moral  judgment 
of  each  observer  is  sure  to  be  affected  and  to  some 
degree  distorted  by  his  own  personal  prepossessions? 
Such  a  course,  frankly  adopted,  its  advocates  claim,  will 
keep  the  bad  men  from  hypocrisy,  the  good  men  from 
self-deception,  and  the  large  number  of  men  who  are 
neither  very  good  nor  very  bad  from  that  mixture  of 
hypocrisy  and  self-deception  which  contrives  to  com- 
bine all  the  evils  of  them  both. 

We  are  told,  in  the  second  place,  as  a  wholly  inde- 
pendent line  of  argument,  that  even  if  an  economist 
possessed  rare  mental  and  moral  quahties  like  those  of 
John  Stuart  Mill,  which  enabled  him  to  sympathize  with 
all  classes,  he  ought  nevertheless,  as  a  matter  of  practi- 
cal politics,  to  identify  his  work  with  the  aspirations 
of  some  one  class  distinctively.  The  assumption  by  an 
economist  that  he  represents  the  total  interest  of  the 
community  rather  than  the  interest  of  one  part  or  group 
in  that  community  exposes  him  to  the  suspicion  of  being 
either  a  pharisee  or  a  hypocrite,  —  either  a  man  who 
over-estimates  his  own  righteousness,  or  one  who  pre- 
tends to  a  righteousness  which  he  does  not  possess.  If 
either  of  these  titles  is  a  just  one,  it  is  fatal  to  a  man's 
success  as  a  political  reformer.  If  it  is  once  suspected 
to  be  just,  it  will  prove  a  heavy  weight  around  his  neck. 
Even  if  a  man  believes  himself  to  be  wholly  free  from 
either  hypocrisy  or  pharisaism,  it  is  a  wise  measure  for 
biTn  to  keep  out  of  the  company  of  hypocrites  and  phari- 
sees.  He  will  be  a  more  efficient  reformer  if  he  claims 
a  little  less  for  his  mission  and  can  get  those  lesser 
claims  recognized,  than  if  he  claims  everything  and 
gets  no  recognition  at  all. 

8S 


ECONOMIC  THEORY  AND  POLITICAL  MORALITY 

We  are  further  told  that  whether  he  be  considered 
a  hypocrite  or  not,  he  will  be  entitled  a  visionary,  and 
justly  so.  The  general  pubhc  whose  interests  he  repre- 
sents is  not  a  working  political  force.  Its  wants  are  so 
vague  and  so  remote  that  there  is  no  means  of  getting 
them  recognized  in  the  concrete  work  of  legislation  and 
of  government.  You  must  appeal  to  locahties  and  to 
classes.  Locahties  have  their  representatives,  classes 
have  their  organs.  Each  locaHty  and  each  class  has  its 
pubhc  sentiment,  which  in  one  way  or  another  is  a  hving 
power  in  pohtics.  This  existence  of  a  coherent  pubhc 
opinion  and  of  a  definite  interest  is  a  necessary  condition 
for  the  social  reformer  who  would  be  more  than  a  pure 
theorist.  Current  opinion  is  his  material,  class  interest 
is  his  tool.  No  man,  however  great,  can  hope  to  accom- 
phsh  his  results  with  neither  tools  nor  materials  ready 
to  his  hand.  Even  if  you  beUeve  yourself  wholly  dis- 
interested you  must  appeal  to  classes  and  secure  the 
partial  good  which  is  attainable,  rather  than  aim  at 
the  greater  good  which  you  are  from  the  outset  fated 
to  miss. 

They  tell  us  further  that  this  view  of  the  matter 
represents  not  only  practical  poUtics  but  practical  ethics. 
Life  in  a  modem  free  community  is  an  interaction  and 
interplay  between  the  several  members  of  that  commun- 
ity. Each  individual  is  working  for  ends  of  his  own, 
distinct  from  those  of  other  individuals.  Each  class 
has  standards  and  ideals  of  its  own,  differing  from 
those  of  other  classes.  Civil  hberty  is  but  a  recogni- 
tion of  these  differences,  —  permission  to  the  various 
members  of  the  state  to  pursue  their  own  several  ends 
under  the  protection  of  a  common  law.  According 
to  this  view,  the  man  who  would  sink  the  interest  of  a 
class  in  a  supposed  general  public  interest  is  but  depriv- 

89 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

ing  that  class  of  its  own  natural  safeguard  in  the  struggle 
for  existence.  If  it  works  for  itself,  it  gets  what  it  can 
—  sometimes  more  than  it  ought,  sometimes  less  than  it 
ought;  but  in  a  reasonably  well-ordered  civil  society  it 
takes  its  chances  with  the  others.  If,  on  the  other  hand, 
a  single  group,  in  its  zeal  for  the  general  good,  omits  to 
pursue  its  own  group  interest,  it  causes  a  want  of  balance 
between  the  parts,  upsets  the  conditions  of  the  game,  and 
contributes  rather  to  its  own  annihilation  than  to  the 
predominance  of  those  conceptions  with  which  it  has 
identified  itself.  Let  us  have  fair  play;  let  us  have  a 
fair  chance  for  conflicting  views  to  struggle  one  with 
another,  as  a  condition  of  progress  for  the  whole  society. 
This  is  the  cry  among  no  small  number  of  those  who 
think  they  have  studied  the  conditions  of  modem  prog- 
ress most  carefully. 

Widespread  and  plausible  as  are  some  of  these  views, 
I  desire  to  take  fundamental  issue  with  those  who  sup- 
port them. 

The  system  of  political  ethics  just  outlined  is  an 
outgrowth  of  our  experience  with  two  important  insti- 
tutions,—  competition  and  representative  government. 
Competition  has  led  people  to  see  how  frequently  the 
seK-interest  of  the  individual,  when  given  free  play,  con- 
duces to  the  general  advance  of  the  pubhc.  Represen- 
tative government  has  shown  how  a  full  expression  of 
opinion  by  those  who  speak  for  the  several  parts  or 
classes  in  the  community  can  be  made  to  contribute  to 
an  advance  which  inures  to  the  advantage  of  all  parts 
and  all  classes  together.  In  spite  of  all  these  facts,  I  be- 
lieve that  the  theory  of  struggle  and  compromise  as  a  nor- 
mal means  of  progress  needs  restatement ;  and  that  the 
man  who  looks  below  the  surface  in  the  study  of  these 
two  institutions  will  be  brought  to  conclusions  directly 

90 


ECONOMIC   THEORY  AND  Jt'OLITICAL  MORALITY 

opposite  from  those  which  prevail  in  so  much  of  the  cur- 
rent thought  of  the  world  to-day. 

Does  the  history  of  competition  give  ground  for  the 
view  that  a  struggle  between  different  parts  for  their 
class  interests  works  out  an  economic  harmony  through- 
out the  nation  ?  Not  at  all.  It  shows,  on  the  contrary, 
that  struggles  within  each  class,  antagonistic  for  the  mo- 
ment to  the  apparent  interests  of  that  class,  so  conduce 
to  the  interest  of  many  other  parts  of  the  body  politic  as 
to  promise  a  generally  beneficent  result.  No  economist 
of  any  reputation  would  hold  for  a  moment  that  an 
economic  conflict  necessarily  works  out  a  just  relation 
between  the  conflicting  parties.  What  the  champion  of 
competition  holds  is  rather  that  this  conflict  under 
proper  conditions  may  become  a  means  of  affording  pro- 
tection and  advantage  to  outsiders.  It  is  not  a  contest 
between  classes,  but  a  contest  within  classes,  which  he 
seeks  to  perpetuate ;  and  he  would  perpetuate  it  because 
he  can  prove,  or  thinks  that  he  can  prove,  that  it  con- 
duces to  a  common  interest  more  wide  and  more  lasting 
than  those  which  the  individual  classes,  if  organized  iuto 
trusts  or  trades  unions,  would  seek  to  pursue. 

It  is  popularly  said  that  competition  is  only  the  form 
which  the  struggle  for  existence  takes  in  modern  civil- 
ized society.  This  is  at  once  true  and  false,  —  true  in 
form,  false  in  the  suggestions  to  which  it  gives  rise. 
The  fact  is  that  modern  civilized  communities  have  so 
regulated  the  struggles  for  existence  that  they  tend  on 
the  whole  to  the  benefit  of  third  parties  rather  than  to 
their  detriment.  Two  cats  struggle  to  eat  the  same  bird ; 
two  bosses  compete  to  employ  the  same  workman.  From 
the  standpoint  of  the  bosses,  the  transaction  bears  some 
analogy  to  the  case  of  the  cats.  From  the  standpoint 
of  the  workman,  the  transaction  bears  no  analogy  what- 

91 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

ever  to  the  case  of  the  bird.  The  more  cats  there  are 
the  worse  for  the  bird,  as  well  as  for  the  cats ;  the  more 
bosses  there  are  the  worse  for  the  bosses,  but  the  better 
for  the  workman.  When  Adam  Smith  showed  the 
efficiency  of  competition  as  a  means  of  regulating  price 
and  of  increasing  useful  production,  he  furnished  a 
powerful  defence  for  the  existing  social  order.  He  can- 
not, however,  for  that  reason,  be  fairly  charged  with 
having  been  an  advocate  of  the  interests  of  the  property 
owner.  The  weight  and  force  of  his  reasoning  lay  in 
the  fact  that  he  showed  the  beneficent  effects  of  such 
free  competition  of  property  owners  upon  all  people, 
whether  they  owned  property  or  not.  He  may  have 
exaggerated  those  good  effects  and  underrated  tlie  evils 
by  which  they  were  accompanied.  This  is  a  point  which 
I  shall  not  now  discuss.  But  his  permanent  and  deci- 
sive influence  as  a  social  reformer  lay  not  in  his  identi- 
fication of  the  views  or  interests  of  any  class,  but  in  his 
discovery  of  a  means  for  preventing  the  unnecessary 
development  of  class  antagonisms.  The  success  of  com- 
petition, far  from  warranting  us  in  the  adoption  of  a 
system  of  political  morality  and  a  theory  of  political 
progress  based  on  advocacy  of  class  interests,  proves 
rather  the  advantage  and  even  the  necessity  of  sub- 
ordinating those  interests  to  a  wider  common  good. 

With  the  institution  of  representative  government 
the  case  is  somewhat  different.  Here  we  have  a  pubhc 
organization  of  localities  and  classes,  and  a  recognition 
of  such  classes  in  the  actual  work  of  government.  It 
would  therefore  seem  as  if  the  success  of  this  system 
were  a  powerful  argument  on  the  side  of  that  theory  of 
pontics  and  of  ethics  which  regards  the  good  of  the 
whole  community  as  best  to  be  reached  by  a  compromise 
betw^eij  the  aims  of  different  sections  of  the  community. 

92 


ECONOMIC   THEORY  AND  POLITICAL  MORALITY 

But  a  profounder  study  of  constitutional  history  leads 
to  an  opposite  conclusion.  It  shows  that  parliaments 
and  congresses,  in  the  reaUy  great  periods  of  their  his- 
tory, have  been  valuable,  not  as  a  field  of  compromise 
between  local  interests,  but  of  information  as  to  general 
ones ;  not  for  the  consununation  of  private  bargains  but 
for  the  creation  of  public  spirit. 

Down  to  the  end  of  the  last  century  the  English 
Parliament,  as  its  name  imphed,  was  essentially  a  place 
for  discussion.  Representatives  from  different  localities 
met  at  Westminster  to  interchange  views  as  to  the  state 
of  the  nation.  Each  member  reported  to  the  others  the 
feelings  and  wants  of  his  locahty;  each  received  from 
his  fellow  members  enhghtened  views  as  to  the  condi- 
tion of  the  country  as  a  whole,  which  he  was  able  to 
report  at  home  and  make  the  basis  of  practical  action  in 
his  section  of  the  community.  The  essential  function 
of  the  early  parhaments  was  the  creation  of  a  united 
pubhc  sentiment.  They  roused  the  interest  of  English 
gentlemen  outside  of  the  sphere  of  their  petty  local  ex- 
igencies, and  enabled  them,  by  common  action,  to  resist 
the  extensions  of  the  royal  prerogative  to  which,  in  the 
absence  of  such  common  action,  they  must  separately 
have  fallen  victims.  It  is  true  that  the  Houses  of  Par- 
liament had  large  functions  in  addition  to  this ;  but  they 
all  grouped  themselves  round  this  central  work.  Even 
the  right  of  the  Commons  to  originate  measures  of  taxa- 
tion, so  sedulously  attacked  by  the  kings,  and  so  jeal- 
ously guarded  by  parliaments,  had  its  chief  importance 
not  as  a  means  of  avoiding  the  imposition  of  burdens 
upon  the  people,  but  as  a  means  of  compelling  the 
monarch  to  call  representatives  of  different  parts  of  the 
people  together  for  the  authoritative  presentation  of 
popular  opinion.    At  the  close  of  the  last  century,  when 

93 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

other  countries  adopted  institutions  modelled  on  the 
Enghsh  Parliament,  it  was  intended  that  they  should 
preserve  this  same  function  as  debating  bodies ;  and  the 
most  glorious  pages  in  the  history  of  the  United  States 
Congress  are  those  in  which  public  opinion  was  formed 
and  public  spirit  roused  by  speeches  of  such  men  as 
Webster  and  Clay.  Just  as  in  the  sphere  of  commerce 
competition  enabled  members  of  the  different  parts  of 
the  business  community  to  get  something  wider  than  a 
class  view  point  and  compelled  them  to  work  to  a  com- 
mon end,  so  in  the  sphere  of  politics  did  representative 
government  enable  and  compel  members  of  the  differ- 
ent geographical  sections  to  get  something  wider  than 
the  local  view  point,  and  to  see  what  was  the  general 
sentiment  of  the  nation  of  which  they  formed  a  part. 

But  in  the  course  of  the  present  century  our  repre- 
sentative assemblies  have  ceased  to  be  places  for  debate. 
The  extension  of  telegraph  and  postal  service  has  given 
the  different  parts  of  the  community  means  of  informa- 
tion more  rapid,  although  in  some  respects  perhaps  less 
trustworthy,  than  that  which  was  furnished  by  their 
congressional  representatives  in  the  olden  time.  The 
press  has  taken  the  place  of  the  legislature  as  a  forum 
for  the  formation  of  public  sentiment.  Parhaments  and 
congresses  have  become  bodies  for  the  making  of  laws 
rather  than  for  the  making  of  opinions.  That  this  change 
has  been  accompanied  by  a  loss  in  salutary  influence  of 
legislative  bodies  is,  I  think,  unquestionable.  No  longer 
do  the  members  strive  to  impress  their  several  convic- 
tions on  the  whole  body  of  which  they  form  a  part ;  they 
strive  rather  to  form  a  compromise  in  which  the  inter- 
ests of  the  part  which  they  represent  shall  have  ade- 
quate recognition.  This  substitution  of  compromise  for 
conviction  as  the  ideal  of  legislative  activity  is  perhaps 

94 


ECONOMIC  THEORY  AND  POLITICAL  MORALITY 

the  greatest  and  most  pervasive  evil  under  which  our 
political  machinery"  suffers.  It  shows  its  effect  in  the 
demoralizing  principle  that  the  representative  should  be 
guided  in  his  utterances  and  his  votes  by  the  opinions  of 
his  constituents,  rather  than  by  his  own,  —  a  principle 
which,  in  spite  of  all  protests,  has  come  to  be  generally 
accepted  as  a  datum  of  practical  politics.  It  deprives 
the  member  of  the  legislature  of  the  educational  influ- 
ence incident  to  his  position.  It  makes  him  an  agent 
not  only  of  his  district,  but  of  his  party  within  his  dis- 
trict. It  manifests  its  results  in  the  debates  on  appro- 
priation bills,  where  the  members  who  stand  up  for  the 
general  interest  of  the  treasury  are  increasingly  rare, 
and  those  who  make  claims  for  the  expenditure  of 
money  on  behalf  of  their  locahties  —  and  often  on  behalf 
of  private  interests  within  their  localities  —  become 
constantly  louder.  It  shows  itself  even  in  general  leg^ 
islation,  where  the  character  of  modern  statutes  as  a 
patchwork  of  private  demands  has  become  only  too 
notorious. 

All  this  has  gone  so  far  as  to  produce  a  change  in  the 
public  estimate  of  parliamentary  bodies.  The  glorifica- 
tion or  ideahzation  of  the  legislature,  so  cormnon  in  gen- 
erations immediately  gone  by,  is  now  rapidly  passing 
away.  In  matters  of  municipal  government  we  are 
lessening  the  application  of  the  representative  system  — 
giving  more  power  to  the  mayor  and  those  persons 
appointed  by  the  mayor,  and  less  to  the  representatives 
of  the  several  districts;  because,  with  the  amount  of 
business  that  is  done  in  the  ordinary  municipahty,  we 
cannot  afford  to  let  the  general  interests  of  the  whole 
be  jeopardized  in  behalf  of  the  several  parts.  The  same 
tendency  shows  itself  in  connection  with  state  legisla- 
tures, whose  sessions  are  now  being  made  less  frequent, 

95 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

and  wliose  sphere  of  action  is  being  narrowed  by  consti- 
tutions and  other  instruments  providing  for  a  reference 
of  all  important  laws  to  the  direct  vote  of  the  people. 
It  is  not  necessary  for  the  purpose  of  this  argument  to 
say  whether  this  change  be  an  improvement  or  not ;  it 
is  at  any  rate  a  significant  sign  of  the  trend  of  the  times. 
The  abandonment  of  the  duty  of  debate  as  to  the  com- 
mon interest,  and  the  substitution  of  the  work  of  nego- 
tiation as  to  the  private  and  partisan  interests  of  the 
several  districts,  have  tended  to  convert  the  representa- 
tive assembly  from  an  object  of  pubhc  confidence  to  one 
of  pubhc  distrust. 

The  causes  which  have  prevented  competition  in  busi- 
ness and  representative  government  in  pohtics  from  fully 
safeguarding  the  interests  of  the  community  in  the  days . 
just  gone  by  are  likely  to  be  accentuated  in  the  near 
future. 

Improvements  in  machinery  and  in  business  organiza- 
tion during  recent  years  have  developed  to  such  an  ex- 
tent that  competition,  in  the  old  sense,  is  in  many  lines 
a  thing  of  the  past.  It  can  no  longer  be  utilized  with- 
out sacrifice  of  pubhc  as  well  as  private  economy.  We 
cannot  have  parallel  railroads  or  competing  water-works 
without  a  loss,  either  from  increased  expense  of  plant  or 
diminished  convenience  in  service.  We  cannot,  in  a  great 
many  hnes  of  manufacture,  have  competition  as  we  had 
it  twenty-five  years  ago,  without  disastrous  fluctuations 
in  price  and  the  danger  of  commercial  crises  due  to  irreg- 
ular investments  of  capital.  AU  these  facts  are  so 
famihar  at  the  present  day  that  it  is  useless  to  enlarge 
upon  them.  Business  has  become  a  trust,  in  a  sense  far 
different  from  that  which  the  accidental  application  of 
this  word  has  carried  with  it,  —  a  thing  involving  a  dele- 
gation of  power  by  the  pubhc  to  the  hands  of  a  few  men; 

96 


ECONOMIC   THEORY  AND  POLITICAL  MORALITY 

a  delegation  of  power  whicli  these  men  can  misuse  to 
the  detriment  of  others  without  being  immediately  over- 
taken by  any  legal  or  commercial  penalty.  That  they 
will  themselves  suffer  in  the  long  run  from  such  misuse 
of  powers  intrusted,  is  very  probably  true;  but  this 
adverse  effect  is  so  remote  and  obscure  that  we  cannot 
rely  upon  it  as  a  protection  to  commercial  society  in 
the  way  that  we  could  rely  on  every-day  competition  in 
the  smaller  and  more  individualized  business  of  fifty 
years  ago.  The  correctives  to  the  abuse  of  individual 
selfishness  in  the  commercial  world  to-day  are  so  much 
less  immediate  and  automatic  than  they  once  were  that 
very  few  persons  now  preach  unlimited  competition  as  a 
means  of  promoting  the  general  good.  So  marked, 
indeed,  is  this  reaction  that  there  is  danger  of  our  having 
too  httle  confidence  in  individual  initiative  in  the  imme- 
diate future,  and  of  regulating  these  trusts  by  an  exer- 
cise of  pubhc  authority  which  may  prove  in  the  long 
run  less  wise  than  private  enterprise  itseK. 

A  similar  change  is  taking  place  in  matters  political. 
Our  municipahties  are  giving  examples  of  combined 
action  in  the  way  of  public  works  on  a  scale  which  would 
have  been  regarded  as  impossible  a  century  ago.  Our 
country  as  a  whole  is  undertaking  yet  larger  combina- 
tions in  the  shape  of  colonial  empire.  What  will  be  the 
ultimate  result  of  this  last  change  of  national  character 
it  is  far  too  early  to  predict.  But  one  thing  is  certain. 
It  will  necessarily  be  accompanied  by  a  recognition  of  the 
fact  that  public  office  is  a  public  trust  more  fully  than  it 
has  been  recognized  in  the  past.  A  federation  of  states 
of  approximately  equal  strength  may  govern  one  another 
on  a  principle  of  separate  pursuit  of  selfish  interests; 
and  although  there  will  be  some  aggregate  loss  through 
the  preference  of  local  interests  to  general  ones,  there  is 
7  97 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

likely  to  be  at  least  a  relative  fairness  when  each  mem- 
ber of  the  federation  is  strong  enough  to  secure  its  own 
share  of  the  plunder,  and  to  protect  itself  from  undue 
imposition.  But  when  we  come  to  administer  the  affairs 
of  a  weaker  nation  to  wliich  we  do  not  and  cannot  give 
pohtical  autonomy,  the  evils  of  the  old  system  become 
so  obvious  and  the  need  of  ideals  in  pohtics  becomes  so 
exacting,  that  even  those  who  in  their  past  public  life 
have  scoffed  at  the  conception  of  a  higher  law  than  their 
own  selfishness  are,  under  the  new  conditions,  compelled 
by  very  shame  to  appeal  to  such  a  higher  law.  The  more 
completely  our  undertakings,  whether  private  or  public, 
industrial  or  pohtical,  take  the  character  of  trusts,  the 
more  impossible  does  it  become  for  those  who  are  placed 
in  authority  to  represent  personal  or  class  interests  with- 
out gross  violation  of  what  we,  in  our  every-day  Hfe, 
recognize  as  fundamental  dictates  of  sympathy  or  of 
justice. 

If  it  were  true  that  each  man's  mental  horizon  were 
bounded  by  his  class  interests ;  if  the  man  who  claimed 
to  look  beyond  them  were  sure  to  be  regarded  as  a 
visionary  or  a  hypocrite;  if  we  were  constitutionally 
inaccessible  to  any  political  motives  higher  than  those 
of  rational  egoism,  —  this  would  simply  mean  that  we 
were  fundamentally  unfit  for  the  task  that  is  before  us. 
It  would  mean  that  the  trusts  which  were  placed  in  the 
hands  of  our  citizens  by  the  new  conditions  of  business 
and  of  pohtics  were  of  a  kind  which  we  could  not  fulfil. 
It  would  indicate  that  the  largeness  of  our  problems 
would  ruin  us  morally  and  poHtically,  as  Rome  was 
ruined  by  her  imperial  problems  two  thousand  years 
ago.  But  I  have  faith  to  beHeve  that  this  is  not  the 
fate  marked  out  for  us  to-day.  I  believe  that  the  Amer- 
ican people  and  the  modern  civilized  world  in  general 

98 


ECONOMIC   THEORY  AND  POLITICAL  MORALITY 

mil  solve  these  problems,  as  they  have  solved  other 
problems  which  have  come  up  in  the  successive  phases 
of  their  history ;  that  we  shall  meet  the  new  collective 
needs  of  industry  and  government  with  a  true  collectiv- 
ism of  spirit  and  purpose.  Not  with  that  superficial 
collectivism  or  socialism  which,  like  the  individualism 
which  it  strives  to  supersede,  often  makes  too  much  of 
mere  political  machinery,  and  believes  that  men  are  to 
be  saved  by  their  institutions  rather  than  their  charac- 
ters ;  but  with  a  public  spirit  which  demands,  as  a  part 
of  the  national  ethics,  that  men  shall  shape  their  course 
on  the  basis  of  conviction  rather  than  of  compromise, 
and  that  public  discussion  shall  look  toward  a  common 
imderstanding  rather  than  a  bargain.  Because  the  polit- 
ical and  commercial  methods  of  the  past  have  led  to 
compromise  rather  than  conviction,  or  because  the  suc- 
cessful man  of  affairs  must  be  ready  to  compromise  when 
he  fails  to  convince,  let  us  not  say  that  aU  politics  and 
all  commerce  is  but  a  tissue  of  compromises,  and  that  a 
political  or  commercial  science  which  pretends  to  be 
something  broader  and  better  than  this  is  an  illusion. 
Let  us  as  economists  take  the  opportunity  that  hes 
before  us,  in  the  face  of  new  conditions  for  whose  treat- 
ment the  old  methods  are  proving  themselves  inadequate. 
Let  us  employ  our  understanding  with  regard  to  public 
needs  as  a  means  of  evoking  public  spirit.  Let  us  use 
whatever  special  knowledge  we  have  with  aU  the  breadth 
of  purpose  which  it  is  in  our  power  to  attain,  and  make 
ourselves,  as  becomes  men  of  science,  representatives  of 
nothing  less  than  the  whole  truth. 


99 


ETHICS  AS  A  POLITICAL  SCIENCE 


During  the  last  hundred  years  there  has  been  a  dis- 
tinct progress  in  the  study  of  legal  and  political  institu- 
tions. The  methods  of  investigation  have  become  more 
scientific,  the  results  more  sound  and  more  permanent. 
But  in  the  study  of  moral  sentiments,  and  of  the  ethical 
framework  of  society,  the  advance  has  been  far  less 
marked.  The  ethical  science  of  to-day,  in  its  assump- 
tions and  its  processes,  bears  a  strong  resemblance  to 
the  political  science  of  a  century  ago.  It  is  the  aim  of 
these  papers  to  apply  to  the  investigation  of  morals  those 
modes  of  analysis  which  have  proved  most  fruitful  in  the 
study  of  political  institutions;  and  to  see  whether  the 
advance  in  method  which  has  actually  been  accomplished 
in  the  study  of  politics  cannot  be  achieved  in  ethics  also. 

Down  to  the  beginning  of  the  present  century,  the 
students  of  political  science  were  pretty  sharply  divided 
into  two  classes.  One  group  started  from  the  assump- 
tion that  there  must  be  somewhere  a  sovereign  unlimited 
in  authority.  Another,  and  in  the  eighteenth  century 
a  more  influential  group,  started  from  the  assumption 
of  an  absolute  right  of  individual  liberty.  Each  con- 
ception was  abstract  and  metaphysical  rather  than  his- 
torical. For  the  time  being,  the  representatives  of  hberty 
made  more  impression  than  the  representatives  of  sov- 
ereignty, because  practical  men  in  the  eighteenth  century 

100 


ETHICS  AS  A   POLITICAL  SCIKKTCE  -     — -,-. 

were  resisting  the  abuse  of  authority  on  the  part  of 
absolute  monarehs,  and  were  quite  ready  to  accept  any 
theory  of  politics  which  seemed  to  justify  such  resist- 
ance.    The  signers  of  the  Declaration  of  Independence 
based  their  theories  on  their  practice,  not  their  practice 
on  their  theories.     They  assumed  that  all  men  had  equal 
and  inahenable  rights  to  hfe,  liberty,  and  the  pursuit  of 
happiness ;  but  they  would  have  been  far  from  ready  to 
push  this  assumption  to  the  logical  conclusion  which  the 
anarchist  would  draw  from  it.     They  believed  in  liberty, 
because   more    hberty,   under  the   existing   conditions, 
seemed  a  desirable  thing,  and  absolute  sovereignty  an 
undesirable   one;   not  because   they  were   prepared   to 
carry  their  avowed  principle  to  its  extreme  development. 
In  the  same  way  those  who  were  most  vigorous  in 
asserting  the  centralized  authority  of  a  sovereign  were 
governed  by  practical  considerations  in  so  doing.    When 
Bentham  averred  that  law  was  the  expression  of  a  sov- 
ereign will,  and  that  whatever  the  sovereign  commanded 
was  law,  it  was  because  he  saw  the  confusion  which 
would  result  if  the  judges  attempted  to  take  any  other 
ground.^     He  rejected  doctrines  of  liberty  and  natural 
rights,  because  doctrines  of  liberty  and  of  natural  rights 
produced   bad   legal  decisions.      Bentham  himself  was 
anything  but  a  partisan   of  absolute   monarchy.      He 
recognized   clearly  enough  that,  even  in  states  where 
the  sovereign  might  theoretically  command  anything  he 
pleased,  such  an  exercise  of  power  would  in  practice 
often  produce  a  revolution.^     Bentham's  fault  lay  not 

*  The  Fragment  on  Government  was  an  answer  to  certain  theories 
broadly  stated  by  Blackstone,  and  concerned  itself  directly  with  the  im- 
possibility of  carrying  out  those  theories  in  judicial  practice. 

2  Bentham  failed  to  recognize  that  nullification,  rather  than  revolution, 
is  the  practical  check  on  the  power  of  the  sovereign,  and  that  the  habitual 
obedience  to  a  determinate  superior,  of  which  he  has  so  much  to  say,  is 

101 


s  i"  A  '"'' 


,,,THE  BDUeATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

in  his  views,  but  in  his  method.  He  formulated  a  meta- 
physical standard  of  sovereignty  which  was  useful  for 
certain  purposes ;  but  he  was  unable  so  to  set  the  terms 
of  that  standard  as  to  avoid  its  apphcation  in  cases  where 
it  was  worse  than  useless.^ 

There  was  one  man  in  the  eighteenth  century  who 
held  nineteenth  century  views  on  the  relation  of  liberty 
and  law.  This  was  Edmund  Burke.  But  even  in  the 
case  of  Burke,  these  views  were  the  result  of  intuition 
rather  than  of  reasoned  judgment.  They  appear  in  the 
form  of  flashes  of  insight,  and  not  as  a  consistent  scien- 
tific system.^  It  was  left  for  John  Stuart  Mill  to  lay 
the  groundwork  for  the  development  of  such  a  system. 
It  was  left  for  writers  like  Morley,  who  combined  the 
views  of  Darwin  with  the  political  knowledge  of  Mill, 
to  carry  this  development  to  its  logical  conclusion.  To 
them,  and  to  the  whole  school  of  modern  historical 
investigators,  liberty  and  sovereignty  are  not  incom- 
patible. To  such  men,  liberty  is  not  a  mere  postulate 
of  logic,  nor  an  assumed  state  of  nature,  but  a  political 

an  obedience  within  limits.  K  the  sovereign  transgresses  these  limits, 
"  passive  resistance  "  follows ;  and  this  phrase,  however  much  ridiculed 
by  a  certain  school  of  jurists,  marks  a  historical  fact  of  the  utmost  im- 
portance. Compare  A.  L.  Lowell  on  The  Limits  of  Sovereignty,  Essays 
on  Government,  pp.  189-222. 

1  Actually,  Bentham  did  a  great  deal  to  prevent  his  legal  system  from 
being  carried  to  dangerous  extremes.  His  doctrine  of  utilitarianism  taught 
men  to  judge  of  the  law  without  reference  to  what  the  sovereign  had 
commanded.  Sir  Frederick  Pollock,  in  his  History  of  the  Science  of 
Politics,  has  pointed  out  that  the  English  doctrine  of  absolute  sovereignty 
is  greatly  modified  by  tlie  English  practice  of  resisting  a  policeman,  and 
that  on  the  continent  of  Europe,  where  their  theories  are  less  absolute 
but  their  policemen  more  so,  the  net  result  is  much  less  favorable  to  free 
development  than  in  England. 

2  It  is  a  great  merit  of  John  Morley  to  have  brought  out  these  points 
in  Burke's  writings  with  a  clearness  which  would  probably  have  surprised 
Burke  himself. 

102 


ETHICS  AS  A  POLITICAL  SCIENCE 

institution  which  forms  part  of  a  national  life.  They 
trace  authority  and  liberty  to  one  and  the  same  cause, 
—  the  necessity  of  self-preservation  for  the  social  organ- 
ism. Authority  exists  because  the  peoples  that  recog- 
nized authority  have  lived,  while  the  peoples  that 
insisted  on  anarchy  have  perished.  Liberty  exists  be- 
cause the  peoples  that  allowed  authority  to  be  despotic 
perished  from  the  rigidity  of  their  political  organism, 
while  those  who  were  able  to  find  a  place  for  individual 
freedom  as  a  part  of  their  scheme  of  authority  learned 
to  adapt  themselves  to  new  conditions,  and  continued  to 
hve  where  the  others  died.  It  is  a  lesson  of  history 
that  a  nation  must  combine  discipline  and  freedom  in 
order  to  reach  the  plane  of  modem  civilized  life. 

Substitute  moral  authority  for  legal  authority,  private 
judgment  for  personal  liberty,  and  it  will  not  be  hard  to 
apply  the  parallel  to  ethics.  Here  too  we  find  a  conflict 
between  the  champions  of  an  abstract  moral  sovereignty 
inherent  in  the  church,  and  the  champions  of  an  equally 
abstract  liberty  of  judgment  inherent  in  the  individual ; 
the  latter  being  to-day  stronger  than  the  former,  because 
the  practical  men  of  to-day  want  to  do  their  thinking  for 
themselves,  instead  of  having  others  do  it  for  them. 
Yet  those  who  assert  the  right  of  private  judgment  as 
a  principle,  in  ninety-nine  cases  out  of  a  hundred  shrink 
back  in  horror  from  the  moral  anarchy  which  would  be 
produced  by  its  logical  application.  The  theory  of  an 
absolute  and  unbounded  right  of  private  judgment,  occa- 
sionally postulated  by  Protestants  of  every  shade,  but 
consistently  carried  out  only  by  extremists  like  Pro- 
fessor Chfford,  is  in  fact  a  purely  abstract  assumption, 
as  unhistorical  as  Rousseau's  natural  right  to  liberty.^ 

^  A  carious  example  of  inconsistencj  of  political  and  ethical  theory  is 
furnished  in  the  first  six  chapters  of  Austin's  Jurisprudence,  where  an 

103 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

There  has  never  been  a  case  where  a  large  body  of 
people  really  carried  the  postulates  of  Protestantism  to 
their  logical  conclusion.  The  nearest  approach  to  it 
perhaps  occurred  in  Greece  in  the  fourth  century  before 
the  Christian  era,  at  the  very  time  of  the  downfall  of 
the  vitality  of  Greece  as  a  nation,  and  in  intimate  con- 
nection therewith.  The  right  of  private  judgment  can 
be  admitted  as  the  right  of  civil  liberty  can  be  admitted, 
as  a  privilege  of  those  peoples  and  those  individuals 
who  will  not  exercise  it  destructively.  But  the  man 
who  makes  it  a  starting-point  in  his  logic  has  apparently 
no  means  of  so  limiting  its  application  as  to  stop  short 
of  moral  anarchism. 

On  the  other  hand,  those  who  make  authority  their 
starting-point  or  postulate  have  no  means  of  stopping 
short  of  despotism  nor  of  avoiding  the  practical  conse- 
quences which  despotism  involves.  The  Catholic  theory 
of  ecclesiastical  sovereignty  may  be  more  logical  than 
the  Protestant  theory ;  but  in  the  attempt  to  apply  that 
theory  the  Catholic  church  has  repeatedly  obstructed 
progress,  moral  as  well  as  material.  The  efforts  of 
enlightened  Catholics  in  the  direction  of  reform,  whether 
successful  or  unsuccessful,  have  served  to  show  how 
strong  is  the  resistance  to  such  reform  which  their 
philosophical  system  offers.  Nor  is  the  difficulty  of 
combining  authority  and  progress  confined  to  those  who 
have  written  and  acted  in  connection  with  the  Roman 
church.  It  is  one  which  besets  every  thinker  who  lets 
the  collective  judgment  of  society  overshadow  that  of 
the  individual.  It  is  one  from  which  neither  Hegel 
nor  Comte  could  wholly  free  himseK.^     Each  of  these 

absolute  doctrine  of  sovereignty  in  law  is  brought  into  contrast  with  an 
equally  absolute  doctrine  of  private  judgment  in  morals. 

1  Compare  Mill,  The  Positive  Philosophy  of  Auguste  Comte,  pp.  68-74. 

104 


ETHICS  AS  A   POLITICAL  SCIENCE 

writers  was  thoroughly  imbued  with  the  idea  of  prog- 
ress. Each  sought  to  trace  in  history  a  continuous 
onward  movement,  and  to  make  the  presence  or  absence 
of  such  movement  the  standard  of  good  or  evil.  Yet 
each  was  hampered  by  his  own  conception  of  authority 
as  residing  in  society  and  not  in  the  individual ;  for  the 
morals  which  society  would  at  any  given  time  prescribe 
were  those  of  the  present,  not  those  of  the  future.  The 
man  who  would  be  the  instrument  of  moral  good  must 
be  for  the  moment,  according  to  the  definition  of  Hegel, 
immoral  in  thought,  if  not  in  act.  He  could  only  help 
society  to  continue  doing  right  by  himseK  doing  what 
society  considered  wrong.  When  Lassalle  asked  how 
there  could  be  any  reform  without  a  revolution,  he 
asked  a  question  which,  from  the  Hegelian  standpoint, 
was  unanswerable. 

Yet  it  is  a  question  which  every  nation  must  answer 
both  for  its  politics  and  for  its  morals.  In  the  exist- 
ing stage  of  civilization  it  is  inadmissible  for  a  people 
either  to  be  stationary  or  to  be  revolutionary.  In  the 
former  case  it  will  be  left  behind.  In  the  latter  case 
it  will  be  wTecked.  There  must  be  some  workable  means 
of  reconciling  authority  and  liberty.  It  was  because  the 
English  first  wrought  out  a  practical  reconciliation  of 
this  sort,  however  unsystematic,  that  England  took  the 
lead  in  European  political  development. 

The  application  of  Darwinian  methods  to  the  study 
of  morals  has  opened  the  way  to  a  theoretical  solution 
on  the  same  lines  as  the  practical  one.  To  a  consistent 
Darwinian  Lassalle's  question  presents  no  insuperable 
difficulty.  To  the  Darwinian  neither  moral  authority 
nor  moral  liberty  is  based  on  a  metaphysical  standard, 
but  on  an  historical  one.  Each  is  justified  in  so  far 
as  it  preserves  the  race  that  holds  it.     Authority,  in 

106 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

morals  as  well  as  in  law,  has  grown  up  because  without 
submission  to  such  authority  a  race  inevitably  perished. 
Liberty  has  grown  up  because,  if  the  authority  was 
carried  to  the  point  of  despotism,  progress  was  wholly 
impossible ;  and  the  race  without  progress  perished  as 
surely  as  the  race  without  authority,  even  though  it 
took  a  longer  time  to  do  it.  In  the  mind  of  a  Dar- 
winian, repression  of  error  is  not  necessarily  or  generally 
a  clear  gain  to  society ;  for  the  repression  of  all  error 
necessarily  involves  the  repression  of  all  change,  and 
the  toleration  of  a  score  of  errors  does  less  harm  than 
the  prevention  of  a  single  piece  of  permanent  good. 
Individual  cases  of  error  are  seK-destructive,  individual 
cases  of  good  self-preservative.  That  system  has  the 
best  chance  of  long-continued  life  which  allows  the 
highest  degree  of  individual  variation  without  destroy- 
ing authority  as  a  whole.^  "When  an  organism,  a  spe- 
cies, or  a  nation  has  ceased  to  vary,  it  has  ceased  to 
grow;  and  any  such  total  cessation  of  growth  is  worse 
than  a  dozen  instances  of  growth  which  is  useless  or 
misdirected. 

The  man  who  has  accustomed  himself  to  make  sur- 
vival a  test  of  right  has  much  in  common  with  the 
upholders  of  authority  on  the  one  hand,  and  with  the 
upholders  of  hberty  on  the  other.  He  unites  the  logi- 
cal vantage  ground  of  the  Cathohc  with  the  practical 
vantage  ground  of  the  Protestant.  Yet  comparatively 
little  use  has  been  made  of  the  survival  test  in  dealing 
with  questions  of  moral  judgment.  The  science  of 
ethics  has  been  regarded  as  a  branch  of  psychology 
rather  than  as  a  branch  of  history  or  of  sociology.  Its 
study  has  been  divorced  from  tlie  study  of  law.  "We 
have  accustomed  ourselves  to  think  of  law  and  morals 

*    Morley,  On  Compromise,  pp.  26&-281. 

106 


ETHICS  AS  A  POLITICAL  SCIENCE 

as  subjects  wholly  separate.  We  have  been  taught  to 
look  to  our  feeling,  to  our  conscience,  to  our  reason, 
as  sources  of  moral  authority;  to  the  courts  and  to  the 
legislatures  as  sources  of  legal  authority ;  and  above  all, 
as  a  matter  of  cardinal  importance,  to  keep  these  two 
things  sharply  distinguished. 

In  the  decision  of  most  of  the  practical  questions 
which  come  up  in  every-day  hfe,  this  separation  is  most 
salutary.  But  in  judging  the  past  history  of  morals,  or 
in  formulating  theories  of  moral  development,  we  are  in 
danger  of  carrying  this  habit  of  mind  too  far.  The 
practice  of  drawing  a  hard  and  fast  line  between  law 
and  morals  is  something  peculiar  to  the  nineteenth  cen- 
tury ;  and  even  in  the  nineteenth  century  it  has  not 
been  quite  so  universal  as  we  have  supposed.  The 
separation  which  we  deem  to  exist  as  a  matter  of  neces- 
sity is  more  or  less  confined  to  our  own  time  and  to  our 
own  country.  There  is  less  of  it  in  Europe  than  in 
America ;  less  in  Catholic  nations  than  in  Protestant 
ones ;  less  and  less  of  it  as  we  go  farther  back  in  the 
world's  history.  Even  in  our  own  country  to-day  the 
ruder  communities  show  a  tendency  to  revert  to  the  time 
when  law  and  morals  were  not  thus  separate.  The 
justice  of  the  half-savage  tribes  in  earlier  stages  of 
history  finds  its  parallel  in  the  justice  of  the  vigilance 
committees  of  the  frontier  towns.  This  savage  justice 
is  based  on  something  which  according  to  modern  con- 
ception is  neither  law  nor  morals,  —  a  body  of  tribal 
customs,  of  which  we  can  hardly  say  whence  they 
derive  their  authority.  Their  sanctions  are  of  such 
a  character  that  we  know  not  whether  to  call  them 
religious,  legal,  or  ethical.  These  ancient  customs  are 
certainly  not  law  in  the  modem  sense ;  for  they  de- 
pend for  their  force  not  upon  any  organized  authority, 

107 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

but  upon  the  collective  feeling  of  a  community,  every 
one  of  whose  members  is  ready  to  punish  any  trans- 
gression. Yet  they  are  equally  far  from  being  morals 
in  the  modem  sense ;  for  they  are  kept  up,  not  by  the 
conscience  of  the  individual,  but  by  a  system  of  organ- 
ized terrorism,  an  ever-present  lynch  law,  ready  to  be 
put  into  execution  upon  the  slightest  provocation. 

It  is  not  necessary  for  our  purpose  to  look  in  detail  at 
the  process  by  which  this  body  of  tribal  customs  was 
evolved.  Much  of  it  can  be  only  a  matter  of  conjec- 
ture.^ But  taking  these  customs  as  our  starting-point, 
we  have  the  means  of  tracing  with  a  fair  degree  of  com- 
pleteness the  subsequent  course  of  events  by  which  they 
were  separated  into  two  parts,  out  of  which  grew  law 
and  morals  respectively .^ 

First,  with  the  development  of  military  organization 
the  work  of  punishing  infractions  of  the  tribal  morality, 

1  Considering  the  date  at  which  it  was  written,  Bagehot's  Physics  and 
Politics  shows  marvellous  fertility  in  this  form  of  conjecture,  and  his  con- 
clusions may  be  quite  generally  accepted  as  working  hypotheses,  in  the 
absence  of  anything  better.  There  are  certain  parts  of  eariy  law  and  mor- 
als for  whose  history  we  have  more  definite  evidences.  McLennan,  Primi- 
tive Marriage,  makes  an  attempt  to  trace  the  institution  of  the  family 
through  successive  stages  from  the  time  when  the  horde  first  introduced 
the  practice  of  female  infanticide  as  the  crudest  and  most  obvious  means 
of  limiting  population.  For  the  early  development  of  property  right  the 
detailed  evidence  is  also  fairly  decisive.  In  the  hunting  stage  we  find  only 
rights  of  possession ;  in  the  pastoral  stage  which  followed  it  we  find  cer- 
tain ideas  of  collective  ownership  of  land  and  separate  ownership  of  cattle ; 
while  with  the  agricultural  stage  the  permanent  settlement  was  marked 
by  the  beginnings  of  indi^^dnal  property  right,  contemporaneous  perhaps 
(though  this  may  be  fancifal)  with  the  beginning  of  individual  responsi- 
bility in  morals. 

2  This  separation,  in  the  form  here  described,  which  is  characterized  by 
Comte  as  "  Military  Polytheism,"  seems  to  have  been  peculiar  to  Europe. 
The  law  of  the  Semitic  nations  has  taken  a  more  purely  theocratic  form  ; 
and  the  same  result,  though  not  without  a  struggle,  was  reached  among 
the  Aryans  of  Asia. 

108 


ETHICS  AS  A   POLITICAL  SCIENCE 

instead  of  being  the  indiscriminate  duty  of  every  one 
was  gradually  delegated  to  particular  individuals.  In 
this  stage  we  find  certain  customs  enforced,  no  longer  by 
pure  democracy  and  simple  lynch  law,  but  by  some  more 
organized  system  of  government,  however  imperfect  or 
arbitrary.  In  the  next  stage  of  development  we  find  not 
merely  a  determinate  set  of  officials  to  secure  compliance 
with  certain  customs  of  the  tribe,  but  a  definite  procedure 
by  which  this  compliance  is  attained.  In  the  oldest  sys- 
tems or  codes  of  law  nothing  is  more  noticeable  than 
the  disproportionate  space  which  is  given  to  procedure. 
These  codes  aim  to  state  the  method  of  obtaining  redress 
for  a  wrong,  rather  than  the  nature  and  content  of  the 
right  whose  infraction  constitutes  a  wrong.^  The  law,  to 
put  the  matter  in  modern  terms,  was  adjective  before  it 
was  substantive.  The  definition  of  the  means  of  getting 
one's  legal  rights  was  antecedent  to  the  definition  to 
those  rights  themselves.  The  third  and  final  step  to- 
ward the  formation  of  law  in  its  modern  sense  was  taken 
when  the  authorities,  charged  with  the  duty  of  enforcing 
the  various  rights  and  customs,  began  to  state  definitely 
which  rights  and  customs  would  be  enforced  by  them  as 
pohtical  officers,  and  which  rights  and  customs  would  be 
left  as  a  residuum,  if  one  may  so  put  it,  for  the  authority 
of  the  church  or  of  reason,  of  rehgion  or  of  ethics.  In 
this  stage  we  have  a  gradual  process  of  separation  of  cer- 
tain principles  whose  infraction  would  be  punished  by 
the  organized  force  of  the  community,  from  the  remain- 
ing body  of  customs  for  whose  violation  the  remedies 
were  less  determinate  and  the  procedure  wholly  indeter- 
minate. The  authority  of  this  residuum  rested  primarily 
on  the  feelings  of  the  tribe  or  nation  rather  than  on  any 
particular  set  of  public  officers. 

1  The  Twelve  Tables  furnish  a  good  instance. 
109 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

In  any  growing  legal  system  we  find  this  gradual  pro- 
cess of  definition,  by  which  matters,  previously  left  to 
one  general  conscience  and  reason,  are  made  determinate 
parts  of  the  law.  Perhaps  the  best  known  instances 
are  to  be  found  in  the  praetorian  jurisdiction  in  Rome 
and  the  equity  jurisdiction  in  England,  —  two  things 
which  have  a  close  analogy  with  one  another.  The  prae- 
tor at  Rome  was  a  public  ofl&cer  with  authority  to  sup- 
plement, by  his  decisions,  the  law  of  the  Twelve  Tables 
in  cases  where  that  law  was  not  sufficiently  explicit,  or 
where  its  direct  application  would  work  hardship.  He 
decided  what  was  equitable  by  his  ovtoi  common  sense ; 
and  this,  when  matters  were  simple,  was  hkely  to  be 
pretty  nearly  the  common  sense  of  the  more  educated 
part  of  the  community.  But,  inasmuch  as  one  praetor 
might  differ  from  another  in  his  views  of  equity,  it  be- 
came a  matter  of  great  importance  for  people  to  know 
how  this  undetermined  part  of  the  law  was  going  to  be 
administered.  To  meet  this  necessity  the  praetor,  upon 
taking  office,  would  issue  an  edict,  stating  what  he  would 
do  in  certain  cases  which  were  likely  to  arise.  With 
each  successive  election  the  forms  of  this  edict  became 
more  and  more  stereotyped;  and  in  the  more  highly 
developed  stage  of  Roman  law  each  praetor  would  begin 
by  stating  that  he  would  uphold  the  same  traditions  that 
his  predecessors  had  upheld,  and  would  then  perhaps 
add  a  few  new  provisions  to  meet  new  difficulties  that 
might  arise.  What  had  been  at  first  left  to  the  praetor's 
moral  sense  was  gradually  systematized,  until  it  ulti- 
mately became  as  explicit  as  the  older  system  which  it 
had  supplemented.  The  same  history  was  repeated  in 
the  equity  jurisdiction  of  England,  and  it  seems  likely 
to  repeat  itself  in  another  form  in  the  jurisdiction  of 
bodies  like  the  Interstate  Commerce  Commission  in  the 

110 


ETHICS  AS  A   POLITICAL  SCIENCE 

United  States,  —  bodies  which  in  theory  have  not  the 
character  or  authority  of  courts,  but  which  are  designed 
to  give  voice  to  the  intelligent  sense  of  the  community 
on  matters  at  first  thought  to  be  extra-legal.  The  deci- 
sions of  such  a  commission,  though  not  law  in  the  tech- 
nical sense,  may  gradually  come  to  have  the  force  of  law 
and  to  be  recognized  as  such.^  All  these  things  are  but 
instances  of  a  general  process  of  formulation  of  succes- 
sive parts  of  what  had  previously  been  morals  rather 
than  law.  There  has  been,  in  other  words,  a  continual 
and  progressive  separation  of  those  things  which  the 
courts  will  enforce  and  for  whose  infraction  determinate 
remedies  are  provided,  from  those  things  whose  enforce- 
ment must  be  left  to  the  sense  of  the  community  at 
large. 

Law,  in  this  view,  is  created  by  a  gradual  delegation 
of  certain  parts  of  morals  to  the  political  authorities  for 
enforcement.  But  it  must  not  be  supposed  that  the 
residuum  could  remain  unchanged  while  this  process 
was  going  on.  The  moral  system  was  developed  and 
altered  in  its  character  as  constantly  as  the  law  itself. 
The  separation  and  definition  of  those  rights  whose 
infraction  was  punished  by  the  government  could  not 

1  The  work  of  courts  of  equity  may  seem  to  be  radically  different  from 
that  of  commissions  in  two  respects :  first,  that  such  courts  had  power  to 
execute  their  decrees,  while  commissions  have  not ;  and  second,  that  courts 
of  equity  applied  the  moral  sentiment  of  the  community  to  remedy  clear 
cases  of  injustice,  while  commissions  apply  abstruse  reasoning  to  the  ex- 
planation of  complex  ones.  The  difference  is  in  either  case  more  appar- 
ent than  real.  A  purely  advisory  body,  under  the  settled  legal  system 
of  to-day,  may  have  as  much  power  as  a  court  of  equity  in  past  centuries, 
whether  for  the  enforcement  of  rights  or  for  the  creation  of  precedents. 
And  the  morality  of  the  present  day  is  so  distinctively  rational  that  a 
new  exposition  of  the  effects  of  certain  lines  of  action  to-day  may  repre- 
sent moral  force  just  as  clearly  as  did  a  new  application  of  moral  senti- 
ments five  hundred  years  ago. 

Ill 


THE  EDUCATION  OF   THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

possibly  come  to  pass  without  radically  affecting  the 
spirit  of  the  remainder.  So  long  as  pubUc  authorities 
could  give  remedies  for  only  a  few  among  the  many 
evils  under  which  we  suffered,  so  long  must  right- 
minded  men  do  their  own  fighting.  The  vigilance  com- 
mittees of  the  frontier  towns  or  the  rough  codes  of 
morals  of  school  boys  bring  this  state  of  things  before 
our  sight  in  the  midst  of  the  existing  civilization.  But 
with  the  addition  of  each  new  domain  which  law  con- 
quers for  itself,  the  necessity  for  extra-legal  force  grows 
less  and  less.  The  law-abiding  spirit  grows  with  the 
growth  of  civilization,  not  because  people  are  more 
ready  to  submit  to  insult,  but  because  they  have  new 
means  of  seeking  redress.  The  case  of  duelling  is  a  last 
remnant  left  from  the  time  when  law  and  morals  were 
not  defined,  and  when  large  groups  of  offences  lay  on 
the  border-land  between  the  two ;  where  the  combatants 
sought  a  remedy  in  extra-legal  force,  rather  than  in  the 
courts  on  the  one  hand,  or  in  public  opinion  on  the 
other.  Where  duelling  prevails  to  a  large  extent,  it  is 
notoriously  impossible  for  modem  conceptions  of  law 
to  hold  good ;  and,  what  is  still  more  to  our  present  pur- 
pose, it  is  equally  impossible  for  modem  conceptions 
of  morals  to  hold  good. 

There  is  a  story  that  an  Eton  head  master  who  ha- 
bitually relied  on  the  use  of  the  rod,  once  expounded 
Scripture  as  follows :  " '  Blessed  are  the  pure  in  heart.' 
Mind  that,  boys.  The  Bible  says  it 's  your  duty  to  be 
pure  in  heart.  If  you  are  not  pure  in  heart  I  '11  flog 
you."  To  modem  ideas  the  absurdity  of  the  story  hes 
in  the  supposition  that  the  domain  of  morals  can  be 
narrowed  down  to  the  limits  of  the  master's  rod ;  but 
to  the  ancient  mind  there  would  have  been  no  such 
absurdity  whatsoever.     To  our  ancestors  of  three  thou- 

112 


ETHICS  AS  A   POLITICAL  SCIENCE 

sand  years  ago  it  would  have  seemed  unreasonable  to 
suppose  that  any  precept  could  have  much  force  unless 
it  had  the  power  of  physical  compulsion  behind  it. 
When  law  and  morals  were  indistinguishable,  the 
domain  of  moral  precepts  was  coextensive  with  that 
of  judicial  ones.  The  community  appears  to  have  re- 
quired of  its  members  conformity  to  certain  definite  cus- 
toms, and  to  have  punished  with  indiscriminate  severity 
all  violations  of  any  such  customs.  For  every  offence 
there  was  a  religious  penalty  threatened  against  the 
whole  tribe  that  permitted  it,  and  swift  physical  ven- 
geance was  executed  by  that  tribe  on  the  offending 
member,  by  whose  action  its  well-being  was  thus  endan- 
gered. But  when  determinate  remedies  were  provided 
for  certain  violations  of  law,  the  duty  of  physical  pun- 
ishment was  delegated  to  the  government;  and  the 
people  were  led  to  lay  more  stress  on  the  religious 
or  ethical  sanctions  for  those  precepts  to  which  the 
sovereign  could  not  in  the  nature  of  things  secure 
obedience  by  physical  force.  The  moment  this  separa- 
tion was  made,  it  opened  the  possibility  of  widening 
the  field  of  moral  authority.  Public  opinion  was  not 
forced  to  limit  its  precepts  to  those  matters  where  its 
violation  could  be  instantly  punished.  It  learned  to 
depend  for  its  power  in  no  small  measure  upon  the 
superstitions  or  the  reasonings  of  the  individual  mem- 
bers of  the  community.  When  conscience  and  the 
police  were  undistinguished,  the  sphere  of  the  authority 
of  conscience  was  very  different  from  what  it  became 
when  the  two  were  separated.  The  people  that  relies 
on  its  conscience  as  a  means  of  enforcing  public  senti- 
ment, and  is  able  to  maintain  that  authority  stoutly 
and  strongly,  can  do  hundreds  of  things  impossible  to 
the  tribe  which  can  conceive  of  no  law  except  one  whose 
•  113 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

infractions  are  repressed  by  violence.  The  history  of 
this  development  of  moral  authority,  though  less  often 
formulated  than  the  history  of  law,  seems  hardly  less 
clear.  In  the  rudest  stages  of  society  concerning  which 
we  can  secure  evidence,  the  authority  behind  the  moral 
law  seems  to  have  been  the  fear  of  an  undefined  and 
vague  supernatural  power, — magic  pure  and  simple. 
As  society  advances  a  little,  a  more  personal  shape  is 
attributed  to  these  powers.  To  this  stage  belongs  the 
development  of  tribal  and  family  religion,  of  the  idea  of 
association  of  gods  with  men,  of  collective  tribal  respon- 
sibihty,  and  of  the  honorific  sacrifice,  —  the  symbol,  not 
of  expiation,  but  of  brotherhood  with  tlie  gods  of  the 
tribe.  In  the  period  next  following  this  the  idea  of  sin 
first  makes  its  appearance.  A  crime  is  no  longer  an 
offence  against  the  gods  of  the  tribe,  involving  aU  mem- 
bers of  the  tribe  alike  and  punishable  only  by  instant 
death,  but  an  individual  act  which  can,  to  some  extent 
at  any  rate,  be  expiated.  To  this  period  belongs  the 
idea  of  expiatory  sacrifice  or  atonement;  the  sin  offer- 
ing of  the  Old  Testament,  as  distinguished  from  the 
thank  offering.  With  the  sin  offering  there  develops 
a  set  of  conceptions  of  infinite  importance  for  modern 
ethics.  Hawthorne's  favorite  idea  of  sin  as  an  educator, 
however  strained  it  may  be  in  its  appheation  to  indi- 
viduals, is  a  most  fundamental  truth  as  applied  to 
nations.  It  is  the  germinating  spot  in  the  develop- 
ment of  the  modem  conscience  and  the  whole  system 
of  ideas  connected  with  it.  The  conception  of  sin  marks 
the  beginning  of  moral  responsibility.  The  community 
has  ceased  to  judge  the  outward  act  alone,  and  takes 
into  account,  however  crudely,  the  intention  of  the  man 
who  performed  it.  The  conceptions  of  merit  and  free 
will  have  their  origin  at  this  point.     Inexphcable  and 

lU 


ETHICS  AS  A   POLITICAL  SCIENCE 

irrational^  to  the  psychologist  of  to-day,  whose  view- 
point is  bounded  by  individual  consciousness,  they  pre- 
sent no  difficulty  whatever  to  the  historian.  Theories  of 
free  will  and  of  merit  had  the  clearest  historical  justifi- 
cation, because  they  were  necessary  elements  in  the  de- 
velopment of  individual  responsibility,  without  which 
responsibility  no  progress  from  the  oldest  tribal  system 
of  morals  was  possible. 

During  this  stage  sin  was  conceived  as  an  individual 
personal  offence  against  a  supernatural  power.  Just  as, 
under  Oriental  laws,  any  disregard  of  a  despotic  author- 
ity was  punished  or  expiated,  so  sin  was  punished  or 
expiated  also.  An  act  was  regarded  as  sinful  because  it 
offended  some  god ;  and  that  was  the  end  of  it.  It  was 
expiated  in  a  certain  way,  because  some  god  had  pre- 
scribed of  his  own  pleasure  that  particular  form  of  ex- 
piation ;  and  that  was  the  end  of  it  also.  The  earliest 
systems  of  morals  are  almost  purely  ceremonial,  just  as 
the  earhest  systems  of  political  law  are  almost  wholly 
occupied  with  procedure.  But  as  a  substantive  civil 
law  developed  out  of  judicial  procedure,  so  in  a  similar 
fashion  a  substantive  moral  law  developed  out  of  sacri- 

1  For  example,  T.  H.  Green  [Philosophical  Works,  11,  319)  speaks  of 

the  free-will  difficulty  as  a  "  question  to  which  there  is  no  answer  because 
expressed  in  terms  which  impli/  that  there  is  some  agency  beyond  the  icill 
which  determines  what  that  will  should  be."  Schopenhauer,  though  he  at 
times  comes  very  near  to  the  historical  method  of  treatment,  ends  by 
wholly  missing  it.  "  Jedes  einzelne  Act  hat  einen  Zweck,  das  gesammte 
Wollen  keinen."  (  Welt  als  Wille,  I,  106.)  But  perhaps  the  most  marked 
instance  of  failure  to  use  historical  methods  in  the  treatment  of  this  sub- 
ject is  found  in  Leslie  Stephen's  Science  of  Ethics.  His  standards  are 
historical,  but  his  explanations  are  not ;  in  other  words,  his  psychology 
is  not  brought  into  line  with  his  ethics.  Instead  of  saying  that  the  com- 
munity has  taught  free  will  to  its  members  as  a  means  of  securing  re- 
sponsibility, he  apparently  holds  that  each  individual  develops  theories  of 
free  will  as  a  result  of  his  own  uncertainty  (p.  428 ;  compare  Schopenhauer, 
•der  Begriff  der  Freiheit  is  eigeutlich  ein  negatirer"). 

116 


THE  EDUCATION  OF   THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

ficial  procedure.  As  this  development  progressed,  the 
content  of  the  moral  law  became  more  important,  and 
the  ceremonial  at  any  rate  relatively  less  so.  The  Mo- 
saic code  marks  a  point  where  this  moral  law  had  already 
acquired  large  substance  and  stability.  It  is  hardly  nec- 
essary to  add  that  such  a  development  of  moral  codes 
necessitates  a  progress,  partial  or  complete,  towards 
monotheism.  Under  conflicting  lawgivers  there  could 
not  be  one  authoritative  code. 

It  is  not  long  before  we  come  to  a  transition  from  the 
stage  where  law  derives  its  authority  from  God  to  one 
where  God  derives  his  authority  from  being  a  lawgiver. 
A  community  which  formulates  and  obeys  a  set  of  moral 
laws  knows  God  primarily  as  revealed  in  those  laws. 
To  a  nation  with  a  conscience  the  Gods  of  mythology 
give  place  to  the  God  of  righteousness.  From  this  point 
it  is  but  a  short  step  to  rationalism  itself;  to  a  time 
when  men  begin  to  judge  God  by  his  own  laws.  A 
people  which  had  reached  the  stage  of  Jewish  morals  in 
the  time  of  Nehemiah  could  not  wait  very  long  before 
developing  the  Pharisaic  rationalism  of  the  centuries 
before  the  Christian  era.  The  obvious  inequalities  of 
justice  that  troubled  them  forced  them  to  the  doctrine 
of  immortality  as  the  only  means  by  which  the  goodness 
of  God  could  be  vindicated,  —  not  the  vague  immortal- 
ity of  the  tribal  religions,  but  a  system  of  immortal 
rewards  and  punishments,  whereby  the  glaring  injustice 
of  this  world  should  be  corrected  in  another. 

With  each  successive  stage  of  progress,  the  authority 
of  fear  becomes  less  and  less  a  determining  factor  in 
conduct,  the  authority  of  conscience  and  reason  a  larger 
one.  It  is  no  wonder  that  as  moral  conceptions  widened 
and  were  separated  from  purely  legal  ones,  people  be- 
lieved this  separation  to  be  more  fundamental  than  it 

116 


ETHICS  AS  A   POLITICAL  SCIENCE 

really  was.  The  most  astute  reasoners,  concerning  law 
and  concerning  conscience  alike,  mistook  the  exponent 
of  political  or  moral  law  for  its  ultimate  source;  mis- 
took the  authority  on  which  the  community  rehes  for 
the  execution  of  a  judgment  for  the  final  power  which 
hes  behind  that  judgment  itself.  It  is  no  wonder  that 
systems  of  jurisprudence  and  ethics  were  formulated 
which  reasoned  thus:  "If  whatever  the  courts  say  is 
law,  the  courts  can  say  anything,  and  it  will  be  law. 
If  whatever  the  conscience  says  is  morally  right,  the 
conscience  can  say  anything,  and  it  will  be  morally 
right."  But  the  conclusion  is  in  each  case  wholly 
wrong.  Neither  the  court  nor  the  conscience  has  the 
free  will  or  independence  here  supposed.  The  form  in 
which  the  court  exercises  authority  and  the  form  in 
which  the  conscience  exercises  authority  are  fixed  by 
the  past  history  of  the  community.  The  courts  cannot 
declare  themselves  independent  of  precedent  and  work 
out  a  new  line  of  decisions  apart  from  the  moral  sense 
of  the  people  and  the  traditions  which  have  guided  it. 
The  individual  conscience  cannot  work  out  a  new  line 
of  judgments  and  a  new  system  of  right  and  wrong  apart 
from  the  traditions  under  which  our  ideas  of  law  have 
grown  up.  Behind  the  courts,  behind  the  legislatures, 
behind  the  church,  behind  the  conscience,  there  is  some- 
thing larger  and  wider  which  has  developed  in  the 
progress  of  centuries,  and  which  finds  its  embodiment  in 
national  law  and  national  character. 


II 

In  a  meeting  between  two  armies,  both  strong,  brave 
and  well  equipped,  the  issue  of  the  contest  is  usually 
decided  by  superiority  of  discipline.     That  army  which 

117 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

can  best  obey  the  general's  orders,  which  is  most  fully 
trained  to  act  in  effective  masses,  and  which  has  most 
thoroughly  merged  the  individuality  of  the  citizen  in 
the  self-devotion  of  the  soldier,  is  reasonably  sure  to 
win.  But  though  the  question  of  disciphne  seems  to 
decide  almost  everything,  there  is  more  than  this  behind 
it.  The  highest  and  best  of  modem  armies  must  have 
something  better  than  mere  disciphne.  With  each  gain 
in  the  range  of  weapons,  each  gain  in  the  numbers 
handled,  each  gain  in  the  complexity  of  the  tactics,  the 
necessity  for  this  additional  something  makes  itself  more 
imperatively  felt.  Between  forces  otherwise  equal,  the 
decision  will  rest  in  favor  of  the  one  where  individual 
thought  and  individual  responsibility  permeate  the  col- 
lective thought  and  the  machine-like  precision  with 
which  the  orders  are  obeyed.  As  between  the  re- 
pubhcans  and  the  imperiahsts  in  the  campaigns  at  the 
close  of  the  eighteenth  century,  as  between  the  Germans 
and  the  French  at  Worth  or  Mars-la-Tour,  the  issue  was 
not  decided  by  numbers  alone,  by  discipline  alone,  or 
by  generalship  alone ;  but  by  the  possibihty  of  seizing 
unexpected  advantages  of  ground,  detailed  points  of  supe- 
riority not  foreseen  in  the  plan  of  the  battle  or  con- 
templated in  the  general  orders,  for  which  one  army  was 
ready  and  the  other  was  not.  It  is  comparatively  easy 
to  train  a  body  of  soldiers  to  advance  in  column  toward 
a  perfectly  well-defined  object.  It  is  harder  to  persuade 
a  regiment  or  a  group  of  regiments  to  advance  in  line 
without  mechanical  support  behind  them.  It  is  hardest 
of  all  to  teach  the  officers  and  the  men  of  a  company  to 
advance  individually.  Yet  at  critical  moments  this  last 
possibihty  must  decide  the  fate  of  the  engagement.  To- 
day more  than  ever  before  victory  depends  not  upon 
intelligent  generalship  and  implicit  obedience  alone,  but 

lis 


ETHICS  AS  A   POLITICAL   SCIENCE 

upon  the  independent  activity  of  the  company  officers 
and  the  independent  bravery  of  the  men. 

And  to-day  more  than  ever  before  the  superiority  in 
morals  rests  with  the  nation  that  depends,  not  on  its 
authority  alone  and  not  on  its  generals  alone,  but  upon 
the  individual  responsibility  of  the  subordinate  leaders 
and  upon  the  power  of  the  men  in  the  ranks  to  preserve 
their  direction.  In  morals  as  in  war  we  must  have,  in 
the  first  place,  discipline,  authority,  self-devotion,  sub- 
ordination of  the  individual  to  the  whole.  Nothing  will 
take  the  place  of  that  spirit  which  enables  and  compels 
the  soldier  to  march  right  straight  to  death  for  the  sake 
of  plain  duty.  But  as  the  times  are  now,  we  must  also 
have  a  power  of  the  individuals  to  decide  upon  their  duty 
for  themselves;  to  see  what  needs  to  be  done  without 
orders,  and  to  take  their  own  chances  in  doing  it.  We 
must  have  our  collective  authority  supplemented  by  in- 
dividual responsibility,  individual  judgment,  and  indi- 
vidual sense. 

Discipline  and  self-devotion  are  underlying  principles 
of  all  ethics.  The  nation  that  does  not  have  them  goes 
to  pieces  irreparably.  Judgment  and  sense  are  the  dis- 
tinctive characteristics  of  modern  ethics.  The  nation 
that  does  not  have  them  is  left  behind  in  the  race  of 
historical  progress. 

But  is  it  possible  to  have  a  thorough  exercise  of  judg- 
ment and  sense  without  a  loss  of  discipline  and  self- 
devotion?  Will  not  the  development  of  the  one,  in 
morals  and  in  tactics,  inevitably  lead  to  the  destruction 
of  the  other?  Is  not  a  man  selfish  as  soon  as  he  begins 
to  reason  out  the  consequences  of  his  action?  Is  not 
all  heroism  impulsive  heroism?  Is  not  all  calculated 
conduct  in  the  last  analysis  selfish  conduct?  Can  we 
have  both  the  heroism  and  the  calculation,  the  collective 

119 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

end  and  the  individual  judgment?  We  must  not  un- 
derrate the  real  difficulty  which  lies  at  the  root  of  these 
questions.  We  must  not  overlook  the  fact  that  in  the 
passage  from  centralized  authority  to  individual  liberty 
there  is  danger  that  the  underlying  discipline,  absolutely 
essential  to  all,  should  pass  away.  It  is  the  hardest 
problem  that  a  nation  has  to  face,  thus  to  decentralize 
its  moral  authority  without  at  the  same  time  losing  it 
altogether.  But  by  nations  as  well  as  by  armies,  this 
problem  must  be  faced  and  solved.  Under  modern  con- 
ditions, that  nation  which  can  farthest  push  its  ration- 
alism without  allowing  it  to  degenerate  into  egoism  — 
which  can  farthest  push  its  individual  freedom  without 
losing  its  collective  strength — is  the  one  that  must 
prevail  in  the  long  run,  and  the  one  whose  moral  system 
has  in  it  the  element  of  permanence. 

The  old  principle  of  tribal  responsibility  secured  dis- 
cipline at  the  expense  of  independence.  It  secured 
effective  authority  over  conduct,  but  it  prevented  such 
conduct  from  being  rational,  at  least  in  any  unforeseen 
emergencies.  It  secured  compliance  with  the  letter  of 
the  moral  law,  and  sacrificed  its  spirit  —  if,  indeed,  in 
those  rude  days,  it  can  be  said  to  have  had  a  spirit.  The 
substitution  of  individual  responsibility  for  collective 
responsibility,  the  development  of  the  conception  of  sin 
and  of  merit,  and,  above  all,  the  recognition  of  intention 
as  an  important  element  in  morality,  made  a  radical 
change  in  this  respect.  People  were  taught  to  assume 
the  existence  of  a  choice  between  good  and  bad  conduct, 
and  to  use  their  reason  in  directing  their  conduct  to 
more  or  less  rational  ends.  This  freedom  —  or  perhaps 
we  should  say  this  assumption  of  freedom  —  made  it 
necessary  for  standards  of  conduct  to  become  either 
much  better  or  much  worse  than  they  had  been  pre- 

120 


ETHICS  AS  A   POLITICAL  SCIENCE 

viously.  If  the  standard  of  the  community,  under  the 
new  system,  remained  unselfish  and  far-sighted,  the  use 
of  freedom  and  intelligence  was  a  clear  gain ;  if  on  the 
other  hand  the  first  use  of  freedom  was  to  overthrow 
discipline  and  unselfishness,  the  gain  was  many  times 
outweighed  by  the  loss.  The  attempt  to  substitute 
moral  responsibility  for  moral  compulsion  was  Hke  the 
attempt  to  substitute  free  labor  for  slave  labor.  If  the 
freeman  would  work  at  aU,  their  work  was  better  than 
that  of  slaves ;  but  there  was  always  a  danger  that  they 
would  use  their  freedom  as  a  pretext  for  doing  no  work 
whatsoever.^ 

When  it  was  believed  that  the  gods  punished  the 
tribe  for  the  sins  of  its  members,  this  behef  was  not  only 
effective  in  practice  but  substantially  true  in  theory.^ 
But  when  the  priests  attempted  to  modify  this  belief 
to  suit  the  development  of  individual  responsibility,  and 
taught  that  the  gods  punished  the  individuals  for  their 
own  sins,  the  formula  lost  so  much  of  its  truth  as  to 
lose  nearly  all  of  its  effectiveness.  That  the  gods 
always  rewarded  the  good  man  and  punished  the  bad 
man,  was  not  true,  in  this  Hfe  at  any  rate.  The  future 
life  might  set  matters  right;  devout  men,  in  all  ages, 
believed  that  it  would;  but  the  future  Hfe  was  not 
a  strong  enough  motive  to  make  the  bulk  of  the  com- 
munity moral.  Its  remoteness  rendered  it  ineffective 
with  one  class  of  minds,  its  uncertainty  with  another 
class.     On  the  races   of  antiquity,   the  general   effect 

1  In  actual  history,  fatalism  has  gone  hand  in  hand  with  slavery, 
rationalism  with  property.  The  troubles  of  Greece  in  developing  ra- 
tionalism side  by  side  with  slavery,  and  those  of  Russia  in  developing 
emancipation  side  by  side  with  fatalism,  show  the  diflBculty  if  not  the  im- 
possibility of  ignoring  the  connection. 

'  The  belief  differs  from  Darwinism  only  in  the  process  by  which  it  is 
reached  and  the  form  in  which  it  is  stated ;  not  in  the  substance  itself. 

121 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

of  reasoning  about  conduct  was  distinctly  demoralizing. 
The  Athenian  public  was  substantially  right  in  its 
estimate  of  the  work  of  Socrates  as  affecting  social  order 
at  Athens.  The  course  of  events  proved  the  truth  of 
the  public  judgment;  and  indeed  the  successors  of 
Socrates,  by  the  form  which  they  gave  their  philosophy, 
vitually  confessed  the  correctness  of  this  judgment. 
For  the  loss  of  popular  belief  in  the  gods,  they  offered 
nothing  which  could  serve  as  a  substitute.  They  might 
talk  of  the  honestum  and  the  utile  and  the  interaction 
between  the  two,  and  show  that  nothing  could  be  useful 
or  advantageous  which  was  not  honorable  and  rational ; 
but  they  got  astonishingly  little  hold  on  the  masses  of 
mankind.  Rationalism,  to  those  tribes  that  had  been 
brought  up  under  the  older  mythologies,  meant  self- 
ishness; selfishness  meant  disruption  of  all  authority, 
followed  by  revolutions  and  barbarian  invasions.  Those 
who  had  any  effective  moral  restraint  left  when  their 
mythology  was  gone,  were  very  few  in  number.  Plato, 
and  nearly  all  his  contemporaries  and  successors,  were 
careful  to  restrict  the  study  of  ethics  to  the  favored 
class  of  citizens  who  would  get  the  most  benefit  from 
the  development  of  the  state,  and  who  could  therefore 
take  this  collective  development  as  an  end.  Wise  under- 
standing of  justice  was  to  be  the  prerogative  of  a  few 
philosophers  and  statesmen  who  were  to  be  maintained 
by  the  rest  of  the  community.  Courage  was  to  be  the 
distinctive  virtue  of  the  soldiers  who  were  to  carry  out 
the  decrees  of  the  philosophers  and  statesmen.  As  for 
the  rest,  let  them  practise  self-restraint,  let  them  learn 
to  mind  their  own  business.  This  was  the  sum  and 
substance  of  ancient  philosophy ;  authority  over  the 
many,  collective  egoism,  if  we  may  so  call  it,  for  the 
few.     But  we   all    know  how  it    turned    out,  —  that 

122 


ETHICS  AS  A   POLITICAL  SCIENCE 

the  many  would  not  be  thus  repressed ;  would  not  mind 
their  own  business ;  would  insist  that  if  it  was  useful  to 
the  community  for  Socrates  to  drink  all  night,  it  was 
also  useful  to  the  community  for  the  "  base  mechanicals  " 
to  drink  all  night;  and  the  Macedonians  came  in  and 
conquered. 

The  Romans  did  somewhat  better  with  their  rational- 
ism ;  for  the  Romans  had  what  the  Greeks  had  not, 
a  well-developed  system  of  legal  ideas,  and  certain  habits 
of  action  and  feeUng  which  carried  the  influence  of 
those  ideas  beyond  the  narrower  sphere  of  law.  When 
their  mythology  went  away  there  was  something  left 
besides  philosophy.  The  ideas  of  this  period  are  em- 
bodied in  the  great  work  of  Lucretius,  De  Rerum 
Natura  —  in  some  respects  the  most  modem  poem  of 
classical  antiquity.  It  reflects  the  state  of  mind  of  one 
who  attempted  to  be  seriously  and  soberly  a  rationalist 
and  at  the  same  time  a  reverencer  of  authority.  It 
reflects  the  hopeless  conflict  between  the  old  moraUty 
founded  upon  a  mythology  which  the  author  could  no 
longer  believe,  and  the  new  morahty  founded  on  Grecian 
philosophy  which  offered  relatively  weak  motives  for 
good  conduct.  The  two  could  not  be  reconciled ;  yet 
the  hard  effort  at  reconciliation  still  continued,  and 
by  its  persistence  showed  a  vitaHty  in  Roman  morals 
and  Roman  religion  and  a  possibility  of  development  in 
Roman  thinking  which  the  Greeks,  with  all  their  acute- 
ness,  had  failed  to  attain.  It  showed  a  possibihty  of 
maintaining  some  of  the  discipUne  of  the  old  Rome 
with  some  of  the  freedom  of  the  newer  philosophi- 
cal thought.  To  understand  this  state  of  things  more 
clearly  we  have  only  to  look  at  the  New  England 
thought  and  New  England  feeling  of  the  last  hundred 
years.    How  many  men  have  we  known  whose  minds 

123 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

were  in  a  hopeless  conflict  between  two  duties  that  they 
saw  and  felt,  —  the  duty  of  believing  iu  the  authority 
of  the  traditional  religion  on  the  one  hand,  and  the  duty 
of  exercising  their  sense  independently  and  fearlessly  on 
the  other.  How  many  persons  have  been  clouded  by 
despondency  in  the  hopeless  attempt  to  reconcile  these 
two  co-ordinate  obligations,  to  follow  traditions  which 
their  sense  could  not  accept,  and  to  use  their  sense  to  an 
extent  which  must  burst  the  bonds  of  old  traditions. 
How  many  times  in  New  England  history  has  the 
experience  of  Lucretius  been  repeated ;  and  how  many 
men  who  could  not  put  it  into  poetry  have  put  into 
action  the  despair  of  the  conflict  which  breathes  through 
the  hues  of  his  verse. 

Wherever  this  conflict  persists  —  wherever  the  con- 
servatism of  feeling  among  the  best  men  of  the  nation  is 
not  swept  away  by  the  flood  of  rationahsm  —  we  have 
a  field  for  the  work  of  religious  reformers,  and  for  the 
new  systems  of  ethical  ideas  incident  to  such  reform. 
It  is  extremely  difficult  to  find  words  to  indicate  the 
nature  of  this  work  and  this  change  of  ideas,  or  to 
characterize,  without  risk  of  misunderstanding,  the  com- 
mon element  in  the  influence  of  Buddha  and  Confucius 
and  Mahomet  and  Jesus.  We  are  hampered  by  a  psy- 
chology which  treats  the  individual  as  self-determined ; 
by  crude  theories  of  inspiration,  and  yet  cruder  theories 
of  reason  and  reahty,  which  have  prevented  the  develop- 
ment of  a  terminology  to  suit  the  needs  of  the  case. 
The  religious  reformer,  in  distinction  from  the  philoso- 
pher, appeals  primarily  to  the  emotions  rather  than  to 
the  reason  of  those  whom  he  addresses.  Perhaps  it 
would  be  better  to  say  that  he  appeals  to  unconscious 
reasoning  (if  we  may  do  violence  to  psychological 
usage)  rather  than  to  conscious.    He  avoids  the  absurdi- 

124 


ETHICS  AS  A  POLITICAL  SCIENCE 

ties  of  the  older  mythology  so  far  as  they  have  pre- 
vented, that  mythology  from  keeping  a  lasting  hold  upon 
the  people ;  he  creates  a  new  theology  having  its  evi- 
dence and  its  warrant  in  the  feelings  and  conduct  of 
those  who  adopt  it.  It  may  be  open  to  criticism  on  the 
narrow  set  of  data  accessible  to  contemporary  philoso- 
phers, as  early  Christianity  was  open  to  the  criticisms 
of  Celsus ;  but  when  Celsus  claimed  that  Greek  philoso- 
phy was  better  than  Christianity,  he  overlooked  the 
fact  that  Greek  philosophy  could  not  take  hold  of  the 
masses  of  mankind  and  influence  their  conduct,  while 
Christianity  could ;  and  so  in  their  several  places  could 
Confucianism  and  Buddhism  and  Mahometanism.  It 
is  one  of  the  most  important  facts  in  any  scientific 
study  of  psychology  that  in  Httle  over  a  thousand  years 
the  whole  civilized  world  could  pass  from  the  dominion 
of  tribal  mythologies,  based  on  tribal  war  and  tribal 
responsibility,  to  broader  theologies,  based  on  individual 
responsibility,  on  moral  sentiments,  and  on  national  if 
not  on  human  brotherhood. 

Nowhere  is  the  difference  between  Christianity  and 
tribal  religions  brought  out  more  clearly  than  in  the 
course  of  the  rationahsm  of  modern  Europe,  as  distinct 
from  that  of  Greece  or  Rome.  The  process  of  religious 
criticism,  wliich  wrecked  Greek  piety  and  Greek  morals 
in  little  over  a  century,  has  gone  on  for  the  last  four  hun- 
dred years  without  any  such  destruction.  The  active 
questionings  which  the  ancients  would  have  confined  to 
a  few  philosophers  are  now  the  common  property  of  the 
masses;  yet  those  masses  are  probably  on  the  whole 
more  unselfish  and  more  law-abiding  than  ever  before. 
Though  we  cannot  avoid  anxiety  for  the  future  we  have 
at  least  no  cause  to  condemn  the  past.  That  which  to 
the  ancient  world  proved  a  speedy  revolution  has  to  the 

125 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

modem  world  not  yet  lost  its  character  of  a  reformation. 
The  protestantism  of  the  sixteenth  and  seventeenth  cen- 
turies has  paved  the  way  for  the  utilitarianism  of  the 
eighteenth  and  the  materialism  of  the  nineteenth,  with- 
out the  downfall  either  of  social  order  or  of  practical 
morality. 

The  leading  conditions  which  distinguished  the  ration- 
alism and  the  ethical  development  of  the  last  four  cen- 
turies from  those  of  the  ancient  world  fall  under  three 
heads :  the  separation  of  law  and  morals  which  made  it 
possible  to  change  the  theories  of  conduct  without  dis- 
solving the  foundations  of  social  order;  the  institution 
of  private  property,  which  had  trained  people  to  work 
for  a  remote  end  intelligently  and  without  compulsion ; 
and  the  feeling  of  sympathy  and  human  brotherhood 
which  found  so  large  a  place  in  the  Christian  doctrine 
that  it  withstood  alike  the  perversions  of  that  doctrine 
and  the  attacks  which  attempted  to  undermine  its 
influence. 

Where  moral  authority  and  legal  authority  were  but 
slightly  distinguished,  any  change  in  the  one  was  sure 
to  endanger  the  other.  But  when  the  two  stood  apart 
in  men's  minds  we  could  alter  our  theories  of  conduct 
without  wrecking  the  whole  structure  of  civil  society. 
It  was  owing  to  the  separation  of  legal  and  moral  ideas 
that  the  work  of  Luther  could  stand,  independently  of 
that  of  Gdtz  von  Berlichingen.  Protestantism  could 
appeal  to  the  masses  without  making  its  success  or  fail- 
ure dependent  on  the  success  or  failure  of  the  Peasants' 
War,  and  without  causing  the  excesses  of  the  fanatics 
of  Miinster  to  be  paralleled  in  every  town  that  rejected 
the  old  faith.  The  separation  of  church  and  state,  in 
short,  allowed  the  defenders  of  social  order  to  range 
themselves  on  the  side  of  moral  progress. 

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ETHICS  AS  A  POLITICAL  SCIENCE 

Of  no  less  importance  for  rational  conduct  was  the 
institution  of  private  property  and  the  training  which  it 
had  given.  Property  taught  people  to  do  disagreeable 
things  for  a  remote  reward,  and  thus  made  them  more 
capable  of  directing  their  efforts  toward  a  distant 
moral  end.  It  prevented  freedom  from  degenerating 
into  inefficiency  and  vice.  It  also  did  far  more  than 
this  in  a  wholly  different  direction.  It  taught  people  to 
see  in  how  many  ways  their  own  interests  were  to  be 
sought  in  promoting  those  of  others.  When  trade  was 
thought  to  be  a  kind  of  robbery,  there  was  no  sin  more 
unsparingly  condemned  than  the  desire  to  make  money. 
But  as  time  went  on,  it  appeared  that  legitimate  trade 
was  not  robbery  but  mutual  service ;  that  a  man  could 
habitually  do  well  for  himself  by  doing  well  for  others ; 
and  that  where  the  superficial  observer  saw  only  a  con- 
flict of  interests,  the  really  far-sighted  business  man 
could  find  a  mutual  harmony.  It  taught  men,  in  other 
words,  how  often  rational  self-interest  and  rational 
unselfishness  might  closely  coincide. 

But  the  most  vital  point  of  advantage  of  modem 
rationalism  lay  in  the  existence  of  a  kind  of  unselfish- 
ness wliich  Christianity  had  been  the  chief  agent  in 
creating.  This  unselfishness  was  a  feeling  to  which  the 
moralist  could  appeal,  either  as  a  source  of  individual 
action,  or  as  a  basis  of  public  sentiment.  The  church, 
in  building  it  up,  had  paved  the  way  for  its  own 
reformation.  It  was  this  feeling  which  gave  power  to 
the  Protestant  appeal  to  the  Scriptures,  because  it 
enabled  them  to  awaken  a  quick  echo  in  the  hearts  of 
their  readers.  It  was  this  which  caused  those  Scriptures 
to  be  interpreted  more  and  more  by  the  light  of  reason, 
until  Christian  morality  became  at  last  frankly  utilita- 
rian, making  happiness  a  standard  of  right.     So  univer- 

127 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

sal  has  been  the  tendency  to  accept  this  standard,  even 
where  the  theology  under  which  it  had  grown  up  was 
more  or  less  completely  lost,  that  philosophers  of  the 
most  divergent  schools,  like  Kant  and  Mill,  have  not 
hesitated  to  treat  it  as  a  self-evident  ethical  principle. 
But  the  course  of  events  in  the  last  few  years  is 
beginning  to  show  that  it  is  not  thus  self-evident. 
Utilitarianism,  as  a  habitual  working  hypothesis,  is  giv- 
ing place  to  rational  egoism,  both  among  philosophers 
and  among  the  mass  of  mankind.  This  change  brings 
us  face  to  face  with  the  dangers  which  proved  too  much 
for  ancient  morality  and  ancient  freedom.  We  can  no 
longer  rest  content  with  that  philosophy  which  would 
treat  altruistic  happiness  as  a  self-evident  standard,  and 
make  such  happiness  the  ultimate  criterion  of  moral 
right.  Such  a  theory  of  ethics  is  no  better  than  the 
crude  theories  of  law  which  prevailed  a  century  ago. 
Nor  can  the  effort  of  Spencer  to  strengthen  utilitarian- 
ism, by  showing  that  enlightened  selfishness  and  enlight- 
ened unselfishness  tend  to  coincide,  be  deemed  a  whoUy 
successful  one.  It  is  chiefly  significant  as  a  confession 
of  the  popular  hold  which  egoistic  ethics  has  secured. 
It  is  not  because  utilitarianism  coincides  with  egoism 
that  we  are  to  accept  it ;  but  because  utilitarianism  as  a 
habit  of  mind  in  the  nation  means  liberty  and  progress, 
while  egoism  means  destruction.  Utilitarianism  is  to  be 
defended  historically,  as  the  form  in  which  organized 
society  can  permit  and  prescribe  the  exercise  of  private 
judgment  without  moral  suicide.  It  derives  its  author- 
ity, not  from  general  grounds  of  natural  right,  but  from 
the  fact  that  the  community  is  preserved  by  the  exercise 
of  private  judgment,  and  finds  it  best  that  this  private 
judgment  shall  be  based  on  utilitarian  standards.  These 
standards  are  not  necessary  moral   elements   in  every 

128 


ETHICS  AS  A  POLITICAL  SCIENCE 

moral  system,  as  Mill  would  have  assumed;  but  they 
are  characteristic  and  distinctive  elements  in  the  higher 
civilization  and  the  higher  morality  of  aU  the  nations  of 
America  and  Western  Europe  for  the  past  hundred 
years. 

How  comes  it  that  this  utilitarianism  which  has  in 
modern  times  by  common  consent  been  made  a  standard 
of  morals  and  a  criterion  for  the  exercise  of  private  judg- 
ment was  aU  but  unknown  to  the  world  of  classical  an- 
tiquity ?  It  was  because  the  religions  of  the  Greeks  and 
Romans  had  not  educated  them,  either  as  individuals  or 
as  nations,  up  to  a  point  where  sympathy  became  a  com- 
mon feeling  and  an  admissible  assumption.  Just  as  in 
constitutional  law  the  possibility  of  hberty  is  dependent 
upon  a  law-abiding  spirit  in  the  community,  upon  a  legal 
education  which  permits  the  exercise  of  individual  re- 
sponsibility, —  so  in  the  case  of  morals,  the  possibility 
of  private  judgment  is  dependent  upon  a  spirit  of  sym- 
pathy in  the  masses  of  mankind,  whose  historical  devel- 
opment is  due  to  Christianity.  Proclaim  liberty  on  the 
South  Sea  Islands,  and  the  inhabitants  will  run  amuck. 
Proclaim  private  judgment  to  a  band  of  robbers,  and 
they  will  at  once  exercise  it  in  a  manner  which  the  com- 
munity could  not  tolerate  for  a  moment.  Civil  freedom 
is  dependent  upon  the  legal  education  of  those  who  hold 
it ;  freedom  of  judgment,  in  like  manner,  upon  the  moral 
education  of  those  who  hold  it.  Modern  America  and 
modern  Europe  have  been  able  to  carry  private  judg- 
ment further  than  has  ever  been  done  before,  without 
loosening  the  bonds  of  cohesion  of  society,  because 
modern  America  and  modern  Europe  work  on  the  basis 
of  such  previous  religious  training  that  utilitarianism 
can  be  taken  as  a  common  standard  and  as  an  almost 
self-evident  motive  on  which  mankind  can  agree.  Under 
9  129 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

a  religion  which  preached  only  law  and  not  love,  only 
power  and  not  altruism,  as  did  so  many  of  the  ancient 
mythologies,  the  exercise  of  private  judgment  meant 
anarchy  and  destruction.  A  few,  like  the  Stoics,  could 
conceive  of  a  general  or  collective  utility ;  more,  like  the 
Epicureans,  could  develop  a  rational  egoism  and  at  least 
make  some  effort  to  practise  it ;  but  to  the  great  majority 
of  those  educated  under  the  older  religions,  the  failure 
of  these  religions  meant  the  substitution  of  an  irrational 
egoism.  It  is  because  we  have  this  historical  basis  of 
sympathy  on  which  to  work,  that  we  can  develop  liberty 
of  judgment  in  morals  as  we  have  developed  liberty  of 
action  in  law.  It  is  thus  that,  with  the  fall  of  so  many 
of  the  older  moral  sanctions,  the  whole  system,  though 
endangered  in  the  apprehensions  of  the  more  conserva- 
tive, has  not  fallen,  and  still  shows  vigor  and  strength. 
In  the  Christian  precept  of  love,  and  in  the  education 
which  that  precept  has  given,  we  still  have  something 
which  can  take  hold  on  the  hearts  of  mankind ;  some- 
thing which  can  enable  them  to  exercise  their  judgment 
without  making  that  judgment  entirely  selfish,  or  losing 
it  in  the  hopeless  maze  of  philosophical  discussion.  It 
gives  them  something  to  work  for  and  to  fight  for,  which 
still  appeals  to  their  sympathies;  something  more  tan- 
gible than  the  social  utility  of  the  Stoics  or  of  Leslie 
Stephen.  It  enables  the  moral  battle  to  break  up  into 
regiments  and  companies  and  skirmish  lines,  without 
cowardly  retreat  or  short>«ighted  self-seeking.  If  our 
minds  have  been  educated  to  feel  the  happiness  of  others 
as  a  strong  motive,  we  need  not  make  shipwreck  be- 
tween the  vagueness  of  the  Stoic's  ideal  on  the  one  hand, 
and  the  demoralization  which  has  attended  that  of  the 
Epicurean  on  the  other.  We  have  something  suffi- 
ciently strong  and  tangible   to  appeal  to   the  mass  of 

130 


ETHICS  AS  A   POLITICAL  SCIENCE 

mankind,  sufficiently  rational  to  be  made  a  basis  of  indi- 
vidual responsibility  and  individual  judgment,  and  in 
virtue  of  both  these  qualities  bound  to  stand  where  other 
systems  fall. 

But,  the  rational  egoist  will  object,  is  not  all  reasoned 
action  selfish  action?  Are  not  all  motives  selfish? 
When  you  calculate  the  results  of  a  course  of  conduct, 
do  you  not  in  fact  present  the  different  motives  as  they 
appear  to  you,  and  choose  the  strongest  of  them  ?  And 
if  you  apparently  choose  an  unselfish  motive,  is  it  not 
that  you  have  been  so  trained  that  your  own  individual 
happiness  is  affected  by  the  feelings  of  others  ?  This  is 
an  argument  which  has  overwhelming  weight  with  many ; 
an  argument  which  has  deceived,  to  a  greater  or  less  ex- 
tent, almost  every  thinker  who  has  approached  this  sub- 
ject as  a  pure  matter  of  individual  psychology  and  has 
not  looked  at  it  from  the  wider  standpoint  of  the  sociolo- 
gist. But  if  this  reasoning  is  sound  it  proves  too  much. 
If  a  man  always  obeys  the  strongest  motive,  this  strong- 
est motive  being  determined  by  his  own  happiness  at  the 
instant,  it  is  his  own  happiness  at  the  instant  which 
affects  his  action  and  nothing  else.^  The  reasoning  of 
the  rational  egoist  destroys  his  own  theories  of  morals 
as  well  as  those  of  the  altruist ;  for  it  makes  far-sighted 
conduct  as  illusory  as  unselfish  conduct.  In  a  certain 
sense  it  is  true  that  every  man  is  always  affected  by  his 
own  happiness  at  the  instant ;  but  it  is  also  true  that  his 
happiness  at  the  instant  can  be  affected  by  other  people's 
happiness,  just  as  much  as  it  could  be  by  his  own  happi- 
ness at  some  future  instant.  The  claim  of  the  rational 
egoist,  that  all  motives  are,  in  the  last  analysis,  selfish, 

1  Strength  of  motive  and  quantity  of  happiness  are  as  incommensur- 
able as  a  linear  mile  and  an  acre.  Strength  of  motive  is  a  matter  of  pure 
intensity ;  quantity  of  happiness  involves  both  intensity  and  duration. 

131 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

would  only  be  practically  true  of  a  community  in  which 
self-consciousness  was  developed  to  an  enormous  degree 
and  sympathy  not  at  all ;  but  such  a  community  would 
have  gone  to  pieces  long  before  there  was  any  time  for 
it  to  apply  the  finer  theories  of  rational  egoism. 

It  is  probably  true  that  as  civilization  advances  the 
conflict  between  rational  egoism  and  rational  altruism 
grows  less  and  less.  To  a  savage  untrained  in  habits  of 
law  or  of  sympathy  or  of  reasoning,  the  antithesis  be- 
tween selfishness  and  unselfishness  is  an  absolutely 
irreconcilable  one.  Develop  him  to  a  higher  level  of 
education,  and  they  become  less  and  less  antagonistic. 
Let  hiTTi  be  thoroughly  trained,  a  man  of  fine  sympathies 
and  far-sighted  judgment,  and  he  will  see  as  a  matter 
of  reason  that  we  are  members  one  of  another ;  will  see 
that  by  pursuing  selfishly  his  own  course  to  the  dis- 
regard of  others  he  would  do  as  the  individual  soldier 
would  do,  who  should  selfishly  pursue  his  safety  by 
running  away  in  the  battle, — would  injure  his  own 
safety  as  well  as  the  safety  of  the  whole  army  and  the 
general  issue  of  the  conflict.  He  will  see  that  only  by 
helping  one  another  can  we  intelligently  carry  out  the 
system  which  should  help  ourselves. 

But  we  must  beware  of  relying  too  implicitly  on  this 
harmony  of  interests.  Such  rationalism  and  such  fore- 
sight, for  the  majority  of  people  at  any  rate,  are  far  re- 
mote ;  and  the  danger  inherent  in  rational  egoism  is  that 
it  will  make  them  put  the  selfish  reasoning  in  advance 
of  the  clear  vision  and  high  education  which  alone  can 
make  such  reasoning  innocuous.  It  is  this  which  gives 
force  to  the  famous  passage  of  Burke,  that  many  men  of 
thought  prefer  to  preserve  ancient  prejudices,  rather  than 
to  trust  everything  to  reason,  lest  haply  short-sighted 
reasoning  should  destroy  all  things  and  wreck  the  whole 

183 


ETHICS  AS  A   POLITICAL  SCIENCE 

nation  itself.  It  may  be  true  that  intelligent  selfishness 
and  intelligent  unselfishness  tend  to  come  closer  and 
closer  to  one  another  and  may  ultimately  coincide.  Yet, 
with  human  institutions  as  they  are  now,  the  connection 
is  not  always  clear;  and  with  human  foresight  and 
human  intelligence  as  it  is  now,  there  is  not  one  man  in 
a  thousand,  perhaps  not  one  man  in  a  million,  that  can 
trust  his  intelligence  to  take  the  place  of  unselfishness. 
There  may  come  a  time  when  the  whole  community  will 
see  that  rational  conduct  means  readiness  for  self-devo- 
tion ;  but  this  time  has  not  yet  arrived.  For  the  present 
we  must  not  rely  wholly  or  primarily  on  rationahsm,  but 
largely  on  tradition  and  feeling.  It  is  the  force  of  per- 
sonal love  and  personal  magnetism  and  the  various  un- 
selfish impulses  which  tend  to  keep  men  together,  that 
is  strong  enough  to  be  made  the  basis  of  a  moral  author- 
ity by  which  the  community  can  live. 

The  really  serious  danger  which  we  have  to  fear  is, 
that  by  too  quick  development  of  a  system  of  rational 
egoism  as  the  ultimate  aim  of  morals,  we  may  expose 
ourselves  to  the  fate  by  which  Greece  and  Rome  fell, 
and  from  which  we,  by  our  Christian  traditions,  have 
thus  far  been  able  to  save  ourselves.  The  importance 
of  a  sound  science  of  ethics  lies  in  the  fact  that  it  will 
enable  our  minds  and  our  consciences  to  work  together 
instead  of  separately.  It  may  be  true,  as  LesHe  Stephen 
says,  that  a  theory  of  motives  is  not  itself  a  motive. 
But  it  is  one  of  those  truths  which  are  more  than  half 
untrue;  for  it  is  unquestionable  that  the  absence  of  a 
theory  of  motives  tends  to  weaken,  on  the  part  of  the 
individual  and  the  community,  those  motives  which  are 
left  unexplained.  If  in  our  own  secret  hearts  we  cannot 
find  logical  grounds  for  those  feelings  of  unselfishness 
in  which  we  have  been  trained,  and  those  acts  of  self- 

133 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

sacrifice  to  which  we  have  become  habituated,  or  if  we 
are  afraid  to  analyze  our  grounds  too  closely  lest  haply 
the  test  may  prove  too  much  for  them,  it  is  inevitable 
that  these  feelings  should  grow  weaker,  these  acts  less 
automatic.  What  is  of  even  more  importance,  we  must 
transmit  them  weaker  to  those  about  us  and  to  those 
after  us.  If  the  community  will  save  itself  from  the 
destruction  of  the  rational  egoist,  it  must  find  a  rational 
theory  that  is  not  egoistic.  It  is  this  which  makes  the 
application  of  the  methods  of  political  science  to  morals 
most  imperatively  necessary.  The  effect  of  no  small 
part  of  the  psychology  of  the  present  day  is  immoral, 
because  the  science  is  based  upon  an  assumption  which 
is  immoral  in  many  of  its  practical  effects,  —  the  assump- 
tion of  independent  workings  of  individual  minds.  Only 
when  we  analyze  the  conduct  and  character  of  individuals 
as  part  of  the  general  history  of  a  race,  only  when  we 
cease  to  take  superficial  phenomena  of  consciousness  as 
ultimate  data  of  science,  only  when  we  have  learned  to 
explain  private  judgment  in  morals  as  we  explain  consti- 
tutional liberty  in  politics,  can  we  hope  to  understand 
either  our  own  conduct  or  the  conduct  of  nations. 


134 


POLITICAL  EDUCATION 

Among  the  ta&hy  deniands  wMcli  are  made  upon  our 
schools  and  colleges  at  the  present  day,  none  is  more 
universally  voiced  than  the  demand  for  a  fuller  course 
of  political  education.  And  for  this  there  is  good  rea- 
son. With  the  growing  complexity  of  modem  life,  the 
difficulties  of  social  organization  and  government  are  in- 
creasing. With  the  growing  pressure  toward  speciaHzed 
training  for  varied  spheres  of  usefulness,  the  danger  that 
we  shall  sacrifice  the  general  basis  of  higher  education 
which  will  enable  us  to  cope  with  these  difficulties  is 
also  increasing.  It  is  not  enough  for  our  schools  to  fit 
men  and  women  to  be  parts  of  a  vast  social  machine ;  it 
must  prepare  them  to  be  citizens  of  a  free  common- 
wealth. If  our  educational  system  fails  to  do  this,  it 
fails  of  its  fundamental  object. 

But  in  thus  recognizing  the  importance  of  training 
for  citizenship,  there  is  danger  that  we  shall  make  mis- 
takes as  to  the  particular  kind  of  training  which  will 
secure  the  results  desired.  A  true  political  education 
is  a  very  different  thing  from  much  that  passes  current 
under  this  title.  To  begin  with,  it  is  not  a  study  of 
facts  about  civil  government.  A  man  may  possess  a 
vast  knowledge  with  regard  to  the  workings  of  our 
social  and  political  machinery,  and  yet  be  absolutely 
untrained  in  those  things  which  make  a  good  citizen. 
This  distinction  is  of  special  importance  at  the  present 

135 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

day,  because  these  topics  have  so  large  a  place  in  many 
of  the  schemes  of  education  which  are  now  being  urged 
by  social  reformers.  We  hear  on  every  side  calls  for 
more  teaching  of  sociology  and  politics  and  civics  and 
finance,  and  aU  manner  of  studies  intended  to  inform 
the  young  American  concerning  the  mechanism  of  the 
political  world  in  which  he  lives.  I  shaU  not  undertake 
to  judge  the  value  of  these  studies  from  the  pedagogical 
standpoint.  I  shall  not  try  to  estimate  whether  the  un- 
doubted advantage  which  they  possess  in  awakening 
interest  is  more  than  balanced  or  less  than  balanced  by 
tlie  danger  of  cramming  which  connects  itself  with  their 
use.  But  when  the  plea  is  urged,  as  it  so  often  is,  that 
they  constitute  a  necessary  and  valuable  training  for 
citizenship,  we  are  justified  in  making  a  direct  protest 
Except  within  the  narrowest  limits,  they  do  harm  rather 
than  good.  As  ordinarily  taught,  they  tend  to  fix  the 
attention  of  the  pupil  on  the  mechanism  of  free  govern- 
ment rather  than  on  its  underlying  principles.  They 
exaggerate  the  tendency,  which  is  too  strong  at  best, 
toward  laying  stress  on  institutions  rather  than  on 
character  as  a  means  of  social  salvation.  They  tend 
to  prepare  the  minds  of  the  next  generation  to  look  to 
superficial  remedies  for  political  evils,  instead  of  seeing 
that  the  only  true  remedy  lies  in  the  creation  of  a  sound 
public  sentiment.  I  would  not  underrate  the  value  of 
knowledge  of  political  fact  to  the  man  or  woman  who 
is  first  well  grounded  in  political  ideals.  But  the  en- 
deavor to  cram  with  facts  as  a  substitute  for  the  de- 
velopment of  ideals  is  at  best  an  inversion  of  the  true 
order  of  education,  and  may  easily  become  a  perversion 
of  its  true  purpose.  For  the  sake  of  a  plentiful  and  im- 
mediate crop  of  that  mixture  of  wheat  and  chaff  which 
is  known  as  civics,  we  run  the  risk  of  unfitting  the  soil 

136 


POLITICAL  EDUCATION 

for  the  reception  of  that  seed  which  should  result  in 
the  soundest  and  best  growth  of  which  the  field  is 
capable. 

Nor  is  it  right  to  conceive  of  political  education  as 
being  primarily  a  training  in  those  scientific  principles 
which  regulate  the  activity  of  governments.  It  is  true 
that  the  teaching  of  science  is  a  far  higher  ideal  than 
the  teaching  of  facts,  and  that  the  pupil  who  has  re- 
ceived this  training  enjoys  a  position  of  inestimable 
vantage  in  judging  social  events  of  the  day.  But  it  is 
also  true  that  the  study  of  political  science  is  an  ex- 
tremely difficult  one;  and  that  if  we  depended  for  the 
success  of  our  political  education  upon  the  truth  of  the 
abstract  doctrines  of  politics  which  have  been  taught, 
the  outlook  would  be  dark  indeed.  One  political  sci- 
ence, and  only  one,  has  reached  a  high  degree  of  ex- 
actitude. This  is  jurisprudence ;  and  just  because  it 
is  an  exact  science,  people  have  ceased  to  pretend  that 
it  is  easy,  and  do  not  attempt  to  teach  it  in  the  schools. 
Next  to  jurisprudence  in  exactness  comes  political  econ- 
omy, certain  parts  of  which  have  been  developed  in  the 
hands  of  experts  to  a  satisfactory  stage  of  clearness  and 
precision.  But  that  which  is  taught  as  political  economy 
in  the  majority  of  institutions  is  very  far  from  having 
this  scientific  character.  And  what  is  true  of  the  cur- 
rent teaching  of  political  economy  is,  I  think,  true  in 
even  higher  degree  of  the  various  branches  of  sociology 
and  politics,  as  they  are  presented  in  the  classrooms  of 
the  present  day.  As  a  rule,  the  teaching  of  sociology 
is  better  when  it  is  called  by  the  plain  name  of  history, 
the  teaching  of  politics  better  when  it  is  made  an  inci- 
dent in  the  unpretentious  study  of  geography.  Under 
the  old-fashioned  name  of  history  or  geography,  the 
description  of  social  phenomena  arrogates  to  itself  less 

137 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

claim  as  an  exact  science  than  its  enthusiastic  devotees 
desire.  But  the  really  essential  elements  in  science  are 
truthfulness  and  precision ;  and  I  fear  there  can  be  no 
doubt  that  the  substitution  of  the  new  names  for  the 
old  has  been  accompanied  by  a  loss  in  these  respects. 
Next  to  an  education  in  political  facts  without  ideals, 
I  can  imagine  no  worse  training  for  the  future  citizen 
of  the  country  than  an  education  in  political  principles 
without  exactitude. 

It  must  constantly  be  borne  in  mind  that  the  training 
of  the  free  citizen  is  not  so  much  a  development  of  cer- 
tain lines  of  knowledge  as  a  development  of  certain 
essential  qualities  of  character  and  habits  of  action. 
Courage,  discipline,  and  loftiness  of  purpose  are  the 
things  really  necessary  for  maintaining  a  free  govern- 
ment. If  a  citizen  possesses  these  qualities  of  charac- 
ter, he  will  acquire  the  knowledge  which  is  essential 
to  the  conduct  of  the  country's  institutions,  and  to  the 
reform  of  the  abuses  which  may  arise.  If  he  does  not 
possess  these  qualities,  his  political  learning  and  that 
of  his  fellow-men  will  not  keep  the  state  from  destruc- 
tion. If  he  has  not  the  courage  to  exercise  his  political 
rights  in  the  face  of  possible  intimidation,  no  amount 
of  acquaintance  with  constitutional  theory  will  save  his 
vote  from  suppression  or  prevent  popular  government 
from  becoming  a  mere  shadow.  If  he  has  not  the 
discipline  to  subject  his  will  to  the  restraints  of  law, 
no  amount  of  knowledge  of  the  beneficent  effects  of 
these  restraints  will  save  the  people  from  that  revo- 
lution and  anarchy  which  invite  tyranny  from  within 
or  conquest  from  without.  If  he  does  not  possess  a 
measure  of  political  idealism  and  disinterestedness  of 
aim,  no  amount  of  knowledge  of  the  needs  of  the  coun- 
try and  the  ways  of  meeting  them  will  lead  to  the  f or- 

138 


POLITICAL  EDUCATION 

mation  of  an  active  public  sentiment,  or  prevent  the 
institutions  of  the  nation  from  degenerating  into  a  more 
and  more  rigid  formalism. 

If  there  is  one  thing  which  distinguishes  the  great 
writers  on  politics  from  the  petty  ones,  it  is  the  recog- 
nition of  this  overwhelming  importance  of  character  and 
public  opinion,  as  compared  with  the  particular  institu- 
tions in  which  that  character  and  public  opinion  may 
choose  to  embody  its  organized  activity.  Unfortunately, 
their  words  on  this  matter  do  not  always  find  ready 
hearing.  The  details  of  the  organization  are  so  much 
more  visible  than  the  underlying  spirit  which  gives  it 
life  that  everybody  looks  at  the  former,  and  few  have 
the  sense  to  see  the  latter.  Every  one  knows  that  Aris- 
totle divided  governments  into  monarchy,  aristocracy, 
and  democracy.  Very  few  know  that  Aristotle  said 
that  there  was  a  more  fundamental  division  of  govern- 
ments into  those  which  were  legitimate  and  those  which 
were  not ;  the  former  being  based  on  the  consent  of  the 
governed  and  acting  in  the  interest  of  the  whole,  while 
the  latter  were  based  on  the  authority  of  a  class  and 
exercised  in  the  interests  of  that  class.  Every  one 
knows  that  Rousseau's  Social  Contract  was  a  powerful 
means  for  the  promotion  of  democracy  in  Europe,  and 
identifies  his  name  with  the  doctrine  that  majorities 
should  rule.  Few  know  that  Rousseau  protested  against 
the  abuse  of  this  doctrine  with  which  his  name  is  thus 
connected ;  that  he  said  emphatically  that  the  majority 
of  the  people  was  not  the  people  and  never  could  be  ; 
and  that  he  only  called  for  the  determination  of  the 
public  wiU  by  majority  votes  as  being  a  better  means 
than  any  other  which  had  been  devised  of  approxi- 
mating to  that  real  public  sentiment  which,  after  all, 
was  the  only  legitLtnate  power.     Let  us  not  adopt  a  line 

139 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

of  education  wliich  shall  emphasize  in  the  minds  of  our 
children  those  details  which  were  trivial  in  Aristotle 
and  those  which  were  pernicious  in  Rousseau.  Let  us 
rather  impress  upon  them  their  responsibility  as  mem- 
bers of  a  body  politic  in  the  formation  of  tliat  sentiment 
running  throughout  the  whole  body,  wliich  is  behind 
the  laws  of  a  free  state,  and  without  which  all  law 
becomes  either  a  mockery  or  a  means  to  the  tyranny  of 
some  over  others. 

But  what  is  this  public  sentiment,  about  which  so 
much  is  said  and  so  little  understood  ? 

"  Man,"  says  Aristotle,  "  is  a  political  animal."  Many 
attempts  have  since  been  made  to  reinstate  this  propo- 
sition in  an  improved  form,  but  on  the  whole  none  is  so 
good  as  the  original.  The  instinct  for  forming  com- 
munities which  shall  be  the  unit  and  centre  of  action 
is  a  distinguishing  mark  of  the  human  species.  In  the 
formation  of  these  communities,  the  thing  which  holds 
them  together  and  marks  them  out  from  those  about 
them  is  not  so  much  a  distinction  of  physical  character, 
or  even  of  mental  quality,  as  a  distinct  system  of  politi- 
cal ethics.  A  man  under  the  influence  of  this  code  of 
political  ethics  imposed  by  the  community  will  do  things 
which  may  seem  to  militate,  and  sometimes  actually 
do  militate,  against  his  self-interest  as  an  individual. 
Under  its  influence  he  will  encounter  personal  danger 
to  promote  public  safety.  He  will  submit  his  passions 
and  desires  to  the  restraints  of  irksome  discipline. 
Hardest  of  all,  he  will  often  perform  disinterestedly  as 
a  trustee  in  behalf  of  the  community  those  powers 
which  the  voice  of  that  community  has  intrusted  to  his 
charge. 

On  that  feeling  which  gives  effect  to  those  political 
virtues  we  have  bestowed  the  name  of  public  sentiment 

140 


POLITICAL  EDUCATION 

It  may  be  said  to  perform  the  same  functions  in  the 
world  of  political  morality  which  the  individual  con- 
science performs  in  the  wider  domain  of  personal  moral- 
ity. And  just  as  codes  of  private  morals  are  unmeaning 
or  formal  unless  there  is  a  sturdy  conscience  to  give  them 
effect,  so  legal  regulations  and  police  discipline  are  but 
a  vain  reliance  unless  public  sentiment  stands  behind 
them  and  comes  to  their  aid.  We  may  carry  the  anal- 
ogy one  step  further,  and  say  that  just  as  in  private 
morality  there  is  an  alternative  between  self-government 
by  one's  own  conscience  and  the  compulsion  of  external 
authority,  so  in  public  morality  there  is  a  similar  alter- 
native between  self-government  by  public  sentiment  and 
the  tyranny  of  a  dominating  power. 

It  will  be  readily  seen  that  public  sentiment,  as  thus 
described,  is  a  very  different  thing  from  much  that 
passes  under  that  name.  If  a  large  number  of  people 
want  a  thing,  we  not  infrequently  hear  it  said  that  there 
is  a  public  sentiment  in  its  favor.  It  would  be  much 
more  correct  to  say  that  there  is  a  widespread  personal 
interest  in  securing  it.  The  term  "  public  sentiment "  can 
only  be  applied  to  those  feelings  and  demands  which 
people  are  willing  to  enforce  at  their  own  cost,  as  well 
as  that  of  others.  The  desire  for  better  municipal 
government  on  the  part  of  the  man  who  is  not  wilUng 
to  labor  for  that  end,  the  effusive  patriotism  of  the  man 
who  hopes  thereby  to  lead  other  people  to  enter  upon  a 
war  of  which  he  may  celebrate^  the  glories  and  enjoy  the 
fruits,  the  denunciation  of  trusts  by  the  man  who  has 
tried  to  do  what  they  do  and  has  not  succeeded,  can 
never  be  regarded  as  expressions  of  public  sentiment 
in  any  true  sense.  They  are  but  instances  of  the  seK- 
ishness,  the  vaingloriousness,  and  the  enviousness  of 
large  sections  of  the   community.     There  is   perhaps 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

nothing  which  more  severely  cripples  economic  reform 
than  a  failure  to  distinguish  between  a  disinterested 
condemnation  of  that  which  we  should  despise  in  our- 
selves no  less  unsparingly  than  we  denounce  it  in  others, 
and  the  interested  outcry  of  those  who  object  to  an  evil, 
real  or  alleged,  simply  because  some  one  else  happens 
to  be  its  beneficiary. 

There  is  just  as  much  need  for  the  training  of  this 
public  conscience  or  public  sentiment,  by  whatever 
name  we  choose  to  caU  it,  as  for  the  training  of  the 
individual  conscience  in  the  affairs  of  private  hfe.  In 
fact,  there  is  all  the  more  need  for  such  training,  because 
the  functions  of  the  public  conscience  are  less  perfectly 
understood  and  the  matters  with  which  it  deals  are 
much  more  complex.  In  the  practice  of  ordinary  per- 
sonal virtues  a  man  or  woman  cannot  go  far  astray  with- 
out being  brought  up  with  a  round  turn  by  social 
disqualification,  if  not  by  the  police  or  the  reformatory. 
But  in  matters  which  concern  the  public  interest,  the 
transgressor,  under  our  present  system,  is  often  entirely 
safe  from  the  condemnation  of  the  law,  and  largely  so 
from  any  active  exercise  of  social  disquahfication  on  the 
part  of  his  feUow-men.  The  greater  the  complexity  of 
our  social  phenomena,  the  less  clear  are  the  applications 
of  some  of  our  standards  of  personal  morality  in  their 
conduct,  and  the  more  does  this  education  of  public 
morality  become  an  indispensable  thing  for  the  com- 
munity that  would  preserve  its  integrity. 

The  means  for  this  education  have  not  kept  pace  with 
the  need.  In  some  respects  we  have  actually  gone  back- 
ward. Grand  as  is  the  work  which  is  done  by  the 
courts  of  the  present  day,  it  is  doubtful  whether  their 
function  as  public  educators  stands  where  it  did  a  cen- 
tury ago.     Partly  on  account  of  the  increasing  difficulty 

142 


POLITICAL  EDUCATION 

of  the  cases  with  which  they  have  to  deal,  partly  on 
account  of  a  theory  of  legal  authority  which  dates  from 
the  beginning  of  the  present  century,  our  judges  have 
contented  themselves  more  and  more  with  the  apphca- 
tion  of  precedents,  and  have  been  less  and  less  con- 
cerned with  the  elucidation  of  reasons  which  should 
appeal  to  the  non-technical  mind.  Add  to  this  the  fact 
that  the  performance  of  jury  duty,  once  an  all  but  imi- 
versal  educator  in  the  principles  underlying  some  of  the 
most  important  branches  of  the  law,  has  now  become  a 
burden  which  men  seek  to  avoid,  and  we  see  how  the 
judiciary  has  been  largely  shorn  of  those  educational 
functions  which  in  the  history  of  the  human  race  have 
been  even  more  important  than  the  purely  technical 
duties  of  the  ofiBce. 

A  still  more  serious  retrogression  has  perhaps  taken 
place  in  the  educational  influence  of  our  pubhc  orators 
and  debaters.  It  is  hardly  more  than  a  generation  since 
the  utterances  of  political  leaders  in  and  out  of  Congress 
were  a  mighty  power  for  the  shaping  of  public  opinion. 
Calhoun  and  Clay,  Webster  and  Lincoln,  formed  by 
their  speech  the  sentiment  of  large  bodies  of  men  on 
matters  of  public  duty.  We  may  differ  in  our  judgment 
as  to  the  rightness  or  wrongness  of  the  conclusions 
which  they  drew.  The  man  who  agreed  with  Calhoun 
will  disagree  with  Lincoln.  But,  now  that  the  clouds  of 
strife  have  passed  away,  all  can  agree  that  Calhoun  and 
Lincoln  alike  appealed  to  something  higher  than  per- 
sonal interest,  created  something  with  more  cohesive 
power  than  a  mere  enhghtened  selfishness,  —  that  each, 
in  short,  was  inspired  by  a  lofty  ideal  of  the  public  con- 
science, and  helped  the  whole  American  people  to  real- 
ize that  ideal.  To-day,  on  the  other  hand,  it  is  almost 
proverbial  that  the  effective  speeches  are  those  which 

143 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

voice  a  prepossession  already  felt,  and  give  a  rallying  cry 
to  partisan  or  personal  interests.  The  system  of  district 
representation  has  gone  far  to  make  legislation  a  series 
of  compromises  between  the  interests  of  the  several  parts 
concerned,  rather  than  an  attempt  to  meet  the  needs  of 
the  whole.  So  far  as  this  change  has  taken  place  in  our 
legislation,  it  has  become  inevitable  that  the  debate  by 
which  such  legislation  is  preceded  should  be  not  so  much 
an  attempt  to  discuss  the  interest  of  the  whole  and  to 
subordinate  thereto  the  interests  of  the  several  parts  by 
an  appeal  to  self-sacrifice,  as  a  skilful  conduct  of  a  ne- 
gotiation where  each  speaker  represents  his  sectional 
demands,  which  he  strives  to  enforce  by  liis  superior 
adroitness  as  one  among  many  players  in  the  game  of 
politics. 

It  is  a  common  saying,  and  on  the  whole  a  true  one, 
that  newspapers  have  taken  the  place  of  orators  as  the 
educators  of  public  sentiment.  That  the  change  has 
been  attended  with  some  advantages,  none  but  the  blind- 
est pessimist  would  deny.  The  average  citizen  learns 
more  facts  through  his  newspapers  in  a  day  than  he 
learned  from  his  public  speakers  in  a  month.  Materials 
for  judgment  are  thus  brought  home  to  him  far  more 
promptly,  and  on  the  whole,  I  am  inclined  to  think, 
rather  more  truthfully,  than  they  were  under  the  old 
regime.  But  whatever  advantages  the  modern  news- 
paper offers,  it  does  not,  with  some  honorable  exceptions, 
recognize  the  duty  of  educating  public  sentiment  as  a 
paramount  one.  From  the  very  circumstances  of  the 
case,  the  daily  newspaper  is  under  a  strong  pressure  to 
emphasize  what  is  ephemeral  as  compared  with  what  is 
permanent;  to  throw  into  high  relief  what  is  crude 
rather  than  what  has  been  thoroughly  digested ;  to  make 
more  use  of  that  which  is  sensational  than  of  that  which 

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POLITICAL  EDUCATION 

is  sedative.  Too  often  it  is  compelled  by  pressure  of 
necessity  to  subordinate  everything  else  to  partisan  ends. 
Even  where  the  editor  himself  has  a  high  ideal  of  the 
possibilities  of  his  vocation,  he  finds  himseH  hindered  by 
a  lower  conception  of  journalistic  duty  which  prevails 
among  the  public  at  large.  Whatever  the  reason,  and 
wherever  the  blame,  we  cannot  rely  on  the  average  news- 
paper of  the  present  day  to  furnish  that  training  in  dis- 
interestedness which  is  the  essential  basis  of  a  really 
powerful  public  sentiment. 

All  these  facts  increase  the  responsibility  which  is 
placed  upon  our  institutions  of  learning.  The  more 
inadequate  the  means  for  forming  a  disinterested  public 
opinion  in  other  ways,  the  more  urgent  is  the  need  that 
our  colleges  should  make  this  one  of  their  chief  functions. 
It  will  not  do  to  have  our  higher  education  a  purely 
technical  one.  However  completely  the  citizens  of  the 
next  generation  may  be  fitted  for  the  exercise  of  their 
several  callings,  our  Constitution  will  not  be  safe  unless 
they  are  also  trained  in  the  principles  which  enable  them 
to  govern  themselves  and  their  fellow-men. 

It  is  an  interesting  thing  to  see  how  the  higher  educa- 
tion of  different  countries  reflects  in  its  organization  and 
character  the  political  institutions  of  the  nations  con- 
cerned. In  France  and  in  Germany,  where  the  citizen  is 
part  of  a  public  machine,  university  life  is  occupied  with 
an  almost  purely  technical  training,  which  fits  each  man 
for  his  place  in  that  machine.  In  England  and  America, 
on  the  other  hand,  where  the  citizen  is  regarded  primarily 
as  part  of  a  governing  body,  we  have  had  a  system  of 
college  education  less  closely  adapted  to  technical  needs, 
but  more  efficient  in  the  creation  of  public  sentiment. 
England  and  America  have  a  system  of  Hberal  education 
in  a  sense  which  France  and  Germany  have  not,  —  an 
10  145 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

education  whose  liberality  consists  not  in  the  superior 
quantity  of  knowledge,  but  in  the  relation  of  that  knowl- 
edge to  civil  liberty. 

How  shall  our  colleges  continue  to  give  the  education 
which  is  liberal  in  this  higher  sense,  —  education  in 
the  virtues  of  the  freeman  as  distinct  from  those  of  the 
slave  ?  In  the  answer  to  this  question  is  bound  up  the 
whole  future  of  the  American  college  as  an  institution ; 
not  only  its  form,  but  perhaps  its  very  existence. 

Its  course  of  study,  in  the  first  place,  must  deal  with 
subjects  which  are  non-professional.  The  student  who 
begins  at  too  early  a  period  of  his  education  to  occupy 
himself  with  matters  pertaining  to  the  gaining  of  bread 
and  butter  is  from  that  very  fact  in  danger  of  losing  sight 
of  his  broader  privileges  and  duties  as  a  citizen.  The 
moral  influence  of  having  the  student's  mind  fixed,  dur- 
ing some  of  the  most  plastic  years  of  his  mental  fife,  on 
things  whose  value  is  independent  of  their  money-making 
power  for  him  individually  is  a  thing  of  incalculable 
value. 

In  the  second  place,  the  course  of  study  must  deal 
with  things  which  are  permanent  and  not  ephemeral. 
The  man  who  would  govern  a  nation  and  lead  its  public 
sentiment  must  not  be  swayed  by  the  misjudgments  and 
distortions  of  the  moment.  There  is  no  power  which  in 
the  long  run  has  more  commanding  influence  over  the 
people  than  the  power  of  a  strong  man  to  adhere  to  fixed 
standards  where  weaker  men  are  unbalanced  and  unset- 
tled by  momentary  confusion.  It  is  this  quahty  of  per- 
manence, I  believe,  more  than  any  other,  which  has  given 
to  classical  literature  its  commanding  pla^e  in  the  edu- 
cational systems  of  countries  hke  England  and  America. 
I  would  not  confine  the  term  "  classic  "  to  the  literatures 
of  Greece  and  Rome ;  but  I  would  insist  with  confidence 

146 


POLITICAL  EDUCATION 

that  the  education  of  free  citizens  should  be  grounded  in 
the  study  of  those  works  which  have  proved  their  great- 
ness, not  by  the  appeal  to  a  single  generation  or  even  to 
a  single  country,  but  by  living  long  enough  and  spreading 
far  enough  to  serve  as  a  permanent  basis  of  thought  amid 
the  shifting  views  and  ideals  of  different  communities. 

In  the  third  place,  it  must  deal  with  large  affairs 
rather  than  small  ones.  In  some  of  our  modern  methods 
of  work  there  is  a  real  danger  that  this  need  may  be  dis- 
regarded. Controlled  as  our  studies  are  by  persons  who 
see  in  every  brilUant  scholar  a  possible  candidate  for  the 
degree  of  doctor  of  philosophy,  there  is  a  tendency  in 
some  quarters  to  substitute  thoroughness  and  minute- 
ness of  detail  for  breadth  of  view ;  and  to  use,  in  those 
general  studies  wliich  are  intended  to  enlarge  the  mental 
horizon,  methods  of  training  which  are  more  fit  for  those 
who  would  pursue  them  for  technical  purposes.  It 
cannot  be  too  strongly  impressed  on  the  teaching  force 
of  the  country,  in  these  days  of  speciahzation,  that  a 
liberal  education  has  in  view  purposes  different  from 
those  which  control  the  specialist,  and  in  some  degree 
opposed  to  them.  Original  research,  of  which  so  much 
is  said,  is  a  valuable  thing  in  its  place ;  but  it  wiU  not 
do  to  have  the  citizens  of  our  republic  regard  the  muck- 
rake as  the  chosen  instrument  of  higher  learning.  I 
would  not  undervalue  for  one  moment  the  importance  of 
hard  and  thorough  work;  but  unless  our  teachers  can 
find  methods  of  securing  this  work  on  broad  lines  instead 
of  narrow  ones,  the  collegiate  education  of  the  country, 
in  its  older  sense,  is  bound  to  pass  away,  because  it  will 
no  longer  be  fulfilhng  its  distinctive  function  in  the 
training  of  the  citizen. 

But  by  no  means  the  largest  part  of  the  education  in 
public  spirit  which  a  college  ought  to  give  is  to  be  sought 

147 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

in  its  course  of  study.  There  is  an  equally  important 
education  given  by  the  students  to  one  another,  and  re- 
sulting from  the  spirit  of  the  place.  On  this  we  must 
rely  for  the  development  of  loyalty  and  seK-devotion 
and  those  moral  elements  which  are  necessary  as  a  basis 
of  public  sentiment  in  a  self-governing  community.  This 
fact  has  an  important  bearing  on  the  choice  of  studies 
to  be  taught  in  the  college  course.  For  the  right  selec- 
tion of  studies  attracts  the  right  kind  of  student  material. 
The  school  which  is  purely  technical,  which  enables  its 
graduates  to  get  large  salaries  at  the  sacrifice  of  breadth 
of  character,  inevitably  attracts,  as  the  years  go  on,  those 
persons  to  whom  money-making  is  the  prime  object. 
The  school  whose  course  is  crammed  with  things  of 
momentary  rather  than  of  permanent  interest  attracts 
those  persons  who  value  the  superficial  or  transitory 
rather  than  the  profounder  things  of  life.  The  school 
whose  methods  of  instruction  are  microscopic  rather 
than  telescopic  attracts  the  minds  that  are  narrow  instead 
of  broad.  But  with  a  course  of  study  arranged  in- 
dependently of  preparation  for  professional  life,  dealing 
with  the  things  of  all  time  more  than  with  the  interests 
of  the  moment,  and  aiming  to  give  all  possible  breadth 
of  intellectual  interest,  we  are  reasonably  sure  of  attract- 
ing a  student  body  capable  of  educating  one  another 
in  disinterestedness,  in  stability  of  purpose,  and  in  that 
sense  of  proportion  which  goes  with  largeness  of  vision. 
Nor  is  the  influence  of  such  students  confined  to  those 
who  are  immediately  associated  with  them.  A  few  suc- 
cessive classes  of  this  kind  can  build  up  a  system  of  tra- 
ditions and  of  sentiments  which  are  hard  to  explain  to 
those  who  have  not  come  under  their  influence,  but 
which,  to  those  whose  privilege  it  has  been  to  feel  their 
power,  constitute  the  profoundest  element  in  the  political 

148 


POLITICAL  EDUCATION 

education  furnished  by  a  college  course.  This  influence 
is  not  confined  to  any  one  department  of  college  activity. 
It  is  manifested  alike  in  the  classroom,  in  the  society, 
or  on  the  playground.  It  carries  those  who  feel  it  out- 
side of  themselves,  and  makes  them  part  of  a  college 
life  whose  freedom  trains  them  for  the  freedom  of  the 
larger  national  life  into  which  they  are  just  entering. 
Taking  our  boys  —  and  in  the  present  generation  our 
girls  also  —  from  different  sections  of  the  country,  it 
makes  them  acquainted  with  their  fellow  men  or  women 
in  a  broader  and  more  national  sense  than  is  possible 
in  the  secondary  school,  and  under  circumstances  which 
contribute  to  the  development  of  wider  ideals  than  are 
possible  in  a  system  of  technical  training.  May  the 
time  be  far  distant  when  these  elements  in  our  college 
life  shall  be  crowded  out  by  the  pressure  of  professional 
studies,  or  weakened  by  schemes  of  education  which  lay 
more  stress  on  the  things  which  lie  immediately  before 
us  as  individuals  than  on  those  which  fit  us  to  be  mem- 
bers of  a  free  commonwealth  and  makers  of  the  world's 
history  I 


149 


HIGHER  EDUCATION  AND  THE  PUBLIC 
WELFARE 

In  these  days  of  progress  and  reform,  when  no  institu- 
tion is  allowed  to  pass  unchallenged,  the  higher  educa- 
tional system  of  the  country  must  be  prepared  to  prove 
its  usefulness  if  it  would  expect  a  continuance  of  pub- 
lic support.  What  does  it  do  for  the  community  ?  Is 
it  worth  what  it  costs  ?  Which  parts  are  most  valuable  ? 
These  are  questions  which  must  be  squarely  faced  and 
satisfactorily  answered. 

I  think  that  there  are  three  distinct  ways  in  which 
higher  education  helps  the  community,  and  by  which  it 
proves  its  right  to  exist.  First,  it  makes  our  people 
better  workers  in  their  several  occupations.  Second,  it 
makes  them  better  members  of  the  body  pohtic.  Third, 
it  makes  them  better  men  morally  and  spiritually.  And 
I  also  believe  that  those  good  results  of  higher  education 
which  are  least  obvious  and  least  easily  measured  in 
dollars  and  cents  are  the  very  ones  which  have  most 
fundamental  importance  to  the  nation  as  a  whole. 

How  does  education  make  a  man  a  better  worker  in 
his  profession?  Partly  by  teaching  him  to  do  in  the 
school  or  the  laboratory  things  which  he  would  after- 
wards be  compelled  to  learn  more  slowly  in  practical 
life,  whether  on  the  farm,  in  the  shop,  or  in  the  office. 
This  is  what  is  known  as  technical  training.  Partly  by 
teaching  him,  in  his  school  or  college  days,  theoretical 

150 


HIGHER  EDUCATION  AND  PUBLIC   WELFARE 

principles  which  in  the  experience  of  practical  life  he 
would  not  be  likely  to  leam  at  all.  This  is  the  idea  of 
scientific  training.  The  distinction  between  the  two 
ideals  is  a  radical  one.  The  former  aims  to  save  the 
time  of  the  student  and  to  put  him  as  quickly  as  pos- 
sible into  a  position  to  do  his  work  and  make  his  money. 
The  latter  aims  to  increase  the  range  of  the  student's 
conceptions,  and  to  give  him  command  of  theories  which 
will  enable  him  to  advance  the  methods  of  the  business 
which  he  undertakes. 

The  advantages  of  purely  technical  training  are  so 
obvious  that  very  few  people  are  blind  to  them.  In 
fact,  those  who  object  most  to  the  cost  and  the  results 
of  higher  education  as  a  whole  are  the  very  ones  who 
wish  the  amount  of  technical  training  to  be  increased. 
"  What  is  education  for,"  they  say,  "  if  not  to  make  a 
boy  a  worker  and  to  save  him  the  necessity  of  learning 
his  trade  after  he  leaves  school  ?  "  In  spite  of  this  fact, 
however,  the  general  tendency  of  education  in  this 
country  has  been  to  become  less  technical  and  more 
scientific,  —  less  occupied  with  exercise  in  details  and 
more  with  teaching  of  ideas.  A  hundred  years  ago  the 
young  man  who  desired  to  enter  a  profession  prepared 
himself  in  the  office  of  some  lawyer  or  doctor,  or  in  the 
study  of  some  minister.  There  he  learned  the  way  in 
which  things  were  done,  —  how  to  collect  a  note,  to 
write  a  prescription,  or  to  compose  a  sermon.  When 
professional  schools  were  established  in  connection  with 
our  universities,  in  the  early  years  of  this  century,  they 
at  first  aimed  to  do  on  a  large  scale  just  what  individuals 
had  been  doing  on  a  small  scale.  They  tried  to  give 
instruction  in  the  details  of  a  man's  life-work.  But  as 
time  went  on,  it  was  found  that  they  could  do  more  good 
to  their  pupils  in  other  ways.    Not  by  telling  the  student 

151 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

how  to  do  particular  things  could  he  be  made  a  good 
lawyer  or  doctor,  but  by  teaching  him  those  principles 
of  legal  interpretation  and  of  scientific  physiology  which 
should  enable  him  really  to  understand  the  cases  that 
might  arise,  and  to  use  the  books  which  bore  upon  those 
cases.  A  similar  development,  though  less  marked,  has 
taken  place  in  many  of  our  best  schools  of  technology. 
No  longer  are  they  places  for  shopwork,  but  places  for 
the  training  of  thinkers ;  of  men  who  may  not  know 
how  to  do  the  specific  things  which  wiU  first  be  wanted 
of  them,  but  who  are  in  possession  of  that  general  knowl- 
edge which  will  enable  them  to  learn  more  thoroughly 
the  real  bearings  of  any  new  problem  as  it  arises.  They 
have  become  less  technical  and  more  scientific. 

The  student  who  goes  out  of  a  school  of  the  more 
modem  type  seems  for  the  moment  less  well  equipped 
than  his  rival  who  has  studied  in  an  office  or  in  an  old- 
fashioned  school  of  the  strictly  technical  character.  He 
does  not  know  the  daily  routine  of  the  business.  He 
cannot  turn  his  hand  and  his  tongue  from  one  thing  to 
another  with  the  quickness  which  the  technically  edu- 
cated man  possesses.  But  as  time  goes  on  this  disad- 
vantage ceases;  and  soon  the  balance  shows  itself  on 
the  other  side.  For  the  man  who  has  devoted  his 
school  life  to  the  learning  of  details  of  office  work  or 
shop  work  soon  finds  that  he  has  a  great  many  things  to 
unlearn.  No  college  can  anticipate  accurately  the  con- 
ditions of  actual  practice.  The  man  whose  hand  has 
been  trained  to  meet  one  specific  set  of  conditions  is 
sometimes  worse  off  than  the  man  who  has  not  been 
trained  at  all.  Far  better  equipped  is  he  whose  educa- 
tion has  been  really  scientific,  and  whose  mind  has  been 
trained  more  fully  than  his  hand.  Has  an  important 
process  been  developed  anywhere?    His  knowledge  of 

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HIGHER  EDUCATION  AND  PUBLIC   WELFARE 

books,  if  it  is  worth  anytliing,  will  enable  him  to  find  it 
out  as  soon  as  possible,  and  to  understand  it  as  fully  as 
possible  from  descriptions  and  suggestions.  He  will 
thus  be  in  condition  to  make  progress  in  the  line  of 
work  that  he  has  chosen.  His  assurance  of  immediate 
attainment  of  a  third-rate  position  may  be  less  than  that 
of  the  man  who  is  educated  only  in  technical  details; 
but  his  chance  of  ultimate  attainment  of  a  first-rate 
position  will  be  indefinitely  greater.  This  is  no  mere 
theory;  it  is  supported  by  the  testimony  of  large  em- 
ployers in  different  parts  of  the  country  and  different 
lines  of  industry. 

But  the  chance  of  gain  to  the  individual  is  not  the 
only  thing  to  be  considered  in  estimating  the  relative 
value  of  scientific  training,  as  compared  with  that  which 
is  purely  technical.  Its  advantage  to  the  nation  as  a 
whole  is  inestimably  larger;  for  it  is  upon  this  higher 
scientific  training  that  national  progress  is  largely  de- 
pendent. The  man  who  has  been  educated  to  be  a 
creature  of  routine  generally  clings  to  old  methods ;  the 
man  who  understands  the  theory  of  his  business  can 
develop  new  ones.  The  gain  to  the  nation  in  having  its 
industry  progressively  directed  and  conducted  is  some- 
thing which  cannot  be  measured  in  dollars  and  cents. 
It  is  a  primary  condition  of  national  efficiency.  It  is 
just  because  America  enjoys  pre-eminence  in  this  respect 
that  she  holds  her  present  place  among  the  nations  of 
the  world. 

But  it  will  be  a  mistake  to  suppose  that  the  profes- 
sional skill  which  our  people  receive  from  the  best  scien- 
tific training  constitutes  the  country's  whole  gain  from 
collegiate  education,  or  even  the  major  part  of  it. 

A  man  is  something  more  than  a  mere  producer.  He 
is  a  member  of  tiie  body  politic,  living  in  constant  and 

153 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

complex  relations  with  his  fellow-men.  The  right  ad- 
justment of  these  relations  between  man  and  man  is  a 
more  difficult  and  important  thing  than  the  development 
of  technical  skill.  National  education,  if  it  is  to  be 
really  national  and  not  individual,  must  prepare  the  way 
for  this  adjustment.  It  must  teach  people  not  only  to 
make  the  most  of  themselves,  but  to  do  the  most  for 
others.  They  must  learn  how  to  communicate  their 
ideas  so  that  others  will  understand  them,  to  arrange 
their  labor  so  that  others  can  enjoy  its  fruits,  and  to 
take  part  in  the  work  of  government  so  that  the 
conununity  as  a  whole  shall  be  directed  by  poUtical 
intelligence  instead  of  political  ignorance. 

In  order  to  insure  clearness  of  communication,  our 
higher  education  must  teach  proper  use  of  language. 
Without  such  power  over  the  means  of  expression,  a 
man's  thoughts  are  of  no  profit  to  any  one  but  himself. 
He  becomes  a  theorist  in  the  bad  sense  of  the  word,  —  a 
person  whose  ideas  cannot  be  made  to  help  others.  It 
is  just  because  of  deficiency  in  precise  expression  that 
theoretical  training  has  been  so  often  brought  into  con- 
tempt. The  Greek  word  from  which  "  theory "  is 
derived  means  "  breadth  of  view."  In  this  sense  the 
more  we  have  of  theory  the  better.  But  a  man  who 
makes  his  real  or  alleged  breadth  of  view  an  excuse  for 
his  inability  to  tell  other  people  about  the  details  which 
they  want  to  know  becomes  an  intolerable  nuisance. 
Nay,  he  may  often  become  a  self-deceived  impostor ;  for 
the  man  who  cannot  put  his  thought  into  language 
which  others  will  understand  is  generally  not  sure  of 
understanding  it  himself. 

In  contributing  to  this  clearness  of  communication,  we 
have  use  alike  for  education  in  Enghsh,  for  education  in 
other  modem  languages,  and  for  education  in  the  classics. 

154 


HIGHER  EDUCATION  AND  PUBLIC   WELFARE 

If  we  had  to  choose  between  the  three,  there  is  no 
question  that  English  is  the  most  important.  It  is  the 
knguage  in  which  our  work  is  done.  The  man  who  is 
a  master  in  its  use  possesses  a  power  of  control  of  those 
about  him  which  can  be  obtained  in  no  other  way.  He 
has  an  unrivalled  command  of  synonyms  which  give 
exactness  to  his  thought ;  for  there  is  no  language 
which  is  nearly  so  rich  as  English  in  words  to  designate 
the  different  subjects  of  modem  interest.  But  this  does 
not  mean  that  it  ought  to  be  taught  to  the  exclusion  of 
everything  else.  Every  one  recognizes  that  we  have  so 
much  need  to  use  French  and  German  that  no  man  can 
be  called  fully  educated  who  fails  to  have  some  knowl- 
edge of  both  these  languages.  Our  national  problems 
may  perhaps  be  solved  by  English  alone ;  our  inter- 
national relations  involve  the  knowledge  of  many  other 
tongues  besides. 

The  reason  for  the  study  of  the  classics  is  at  first  sight 
less  obvious.  The  time  spent  upon  them  is  so  great, 
and  their  tangible  usefulness  seems  so  small,  that  many 
people  regard  the  whole  matter  as  a  waste  of  labor. 
Such  reformers  would  have  our  schoolboys  read  Homer 
or  Cicero  in  translations,  and  would  have  the  time  for 
grammatical  drill  spent  upon  Enghsh  sentences  instead 
of  Greek  or  Latin.  The  chief  difficulty  with  this  plan  is 
that  we  have  at  present  so  few  teachers  who  are  compe- 
tent to  give  good  instruction  in  English  except  through 
the  medium  of  Latin  or  Greek.  Over  and  over  again 
have  I  heard  men  argue  for  the  extension  of  Enghsh 
teaching  in  place  of  the  classics,  when  the  speakers 
showed  by  their  diction,  their  grammar,  and  their  rheto- 
ric, that  they  had  not  the  least  conception  of  what  good 
Enghsh  expression  really  was.  No  man  thinks  that  he 
can  teach  Latin  without  having  studied  it.     His  knowl- 

155 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

edge  of  Latin  may  be  defective  in  a  great  many  ways, 
but  he  at  least  knows  his  deficiencies.  On  the  other 
hand,  there  are  thousands  of  men  in  the  country  who 
have  never  thoroughly  studied  English,  but  who  would 
be  iusulted  at  the  suggestion  that  they  did  not  know  it 
well  enough  for  all  practical  purposes,  including  those 
of  instruction.  The  marvellous  grammatical  system  of 
Latin  or  of  Greek,  coming  to  us  in  a  foreign  language, 
arrests  our  attention  and  makes  teachers  and  scholars 
feel  that  it  is  something  to  be  seriously  studied.  When 
we  have  a  body  of  teachers  who  are  ready  to  teach  Eng- 
Hsh  with  equal  seriousness,  and  are  able  to  suppress 
that  vastly  greater  body  who  handle  it  mechanically  or 
carelessly,  then,  and  not  till  then,  shall  we  be  able  to 
talk  of  superseding  the  classics  in  our  educational  sys- 
tem. Under  present  conditions  they  remain  vitally  im- 
portant to  the  welfare  of  the  country  as  a  means  to 
accurate  expression  and  clear  thought  in  the  communi- 
cations between  man  and  man. 

Nor  is  it  enough  that  our  educated  men  should  be 
able  to  communicate  their  own  ideas.  They  must  also 
have  the  necessary  intellectual  basis  for  understanding 
the  ideas  of  others.  A  body  of  men  of  whom  each  is 
interested  exclusively  in  his  own  separate  pursuits  is  in 
no  sense  an  intellectual  society.  As  a  means  to  the 
highest  progress  of  the  whole  body,  the  student  of  litera- 
ture must  know  enough  of  science  to  be  inspired  by 
scientific  achievements;  the  expert  in  science  must 
know  enough  of  literature  to  feel  the  benefit  from  the 
best  works  of  poetry  and  fiction.  If  there  is  any  one 
characteristic  which  distinguishes  the  liberally  educated 
man  from  his  fellows,  it  is  that  breadth  of  view  which 
prevents  him  from  being  absorbed  in  his  own  pursuits, 
to  the  exclusion  of  the  wider  range  of  human  interests. 

156 


HIGHER  EDUCATION  AND  PUBLIC   WELFARE 

But  this  is  not  all.  Our  students  must  learn  not  only 
to  communicate  ideas  to  others  and  to  receive  ideas  from 
others,  but  also  to  adapt  their  work  to  others'  wants. 
They  must  know  how  to  suit  their  products,  whether 
material  or  intellectual,  to  the  needs  of  those  about 
them.  A  well-arranged  college  course  provides  for  this 
in  two  ways.  It  does  something  toward  this  end  by  the 
teaching  of  political  economy  and  sciences  allied  to  it. 
By  showing  the  places  which  different  men  hold  in  the 
busiaess  organism,  it  enables  many  of  us  to  avoid  mis- 
judgments  and  mistakes  which  might  render  our  best 
work  futile.  But  there  is  an  indirect  way  in  which  a 
college  course  contributes  more  surely  toward  the  same 
result.  By  allowing  the  student  the  choice  of  serious 
studies  in  a  wide  range  of  subjects,  it  enables  him  to 
make  experiments  which  help  him  to  decide  upon  the 
line  in  which  he  is  best  fitted  to  serve  his  fellow-men. 
The  man  whom  nature  intended  for  a  doctor,  but  whom 
fate  has  driven  into  a  lawyer's  office,  does  not  find  out 
his  mistake  until  years  of  preliminary  work  have  made  it 
irrevocable.  The  farmer  who  is  spoiled  by  trying  to  be 
a  minister,  and  the  minister  who  is  spoiled  by  trying  to 
be  a  farmer,  have  both  gone  so  far  in  their  ill-chosen  call- 
ings as  to  be  in  many  respects  unfitted  for  the  career  for 
which  nature  designed  them.  But  if  the  student  has, 
during  his  college  course,  studied  physiology  and  consti- 
tutional law  side  by  side,  or  has  had  the  chance  to  make 
experiments  alike  in  providing  for  men's  bodies  and  in 
saving  men's  souls,  he  can  see  far  more  clearly  where 
his  talent  lies,  and  can  let  the  experience  of  a  suigle  year 
determine  rightly  what  otherwise  could  only  be  decided 
too  late  for  repentance. 

A  college  course,  if  properly  directed,  must  also  train 
its  students  in  the  obligations  of  citizenship.    This  func- 

157 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

tion  is  more  important  in  America  than  anywhere  else. 
An  American  does  not  fulfil  liis  whole  duty  if  he  is  only 
a  skilful  specialist,  or  even  if  he  is  a  good  business  man 
and  nothing  more.  He  has  a  broader  duty  as  part  of  a 
sovereign  people.  He  must  know  the  constitution  of 
the  country  and  the  spirit  of  its  laws ;  not  in  that  per- 
functory way  which  is  obtained  by  the  acquisition  of  a 
few  facts,  but  by  a  severe  training  in  those  principles  of 
ethics  and  politics  which  are  needed  for  the  preservation 
of  a  free  commonwealth.  He  must  understand  the  in- 
direct effects  of  legislation  no  less  than  its  direct  and 
obvious  ones.  He  must  be  familiar  with  the  political 
history  of  his  own  nation  and  of  other  nations  beside  his 
own,  in  order  that  he  may  be  a  leader  who  will  enable 
his  fellow-men  to  look  beyond  the  passions  and  preju- 
dices of  the  moment,  and  help  them  to  see  what  is  the 
probable  bearing  of  the  issues,  as  they  arise,  on  the 
future  welfare  of  the  community. 

Rightly  to  accomplish  this,  the  college  must  give  its 
students  something  more  than  mere  training  of  the  in- 
tellect. Much  as  intelKgence  is  needed  in  the  conduct 
of  our  business  and  our  politics,  we  have  learned  that 
intelligence  alone  will  not  accomplish  everything.  The 
higher  education  will  do  little  toward  making  more 
efficient  citizens  unless  it  makes  at  the  same  time  broader 
and  better  men.  It  must  so  inspire  those  who  come 
under  its  influence  that  they  shall  apply,  in  the  conduct 
of  the  larger  affairs  of  the  community,  those  principles 
of  morals  which  are  recognized  as  obligatory  upon  us  in 
our  relation  to  our  families  and  our  neighbors. 

AU  intelligent  study  of  science,  whether  it  be  physics 
or  biology,  psychology  or  history,  should  train  a  man  in 
that  respect  for  law  which  is  the  best  antidote  to  capri- 
cious self-will  on  the  part  of  the  individual.     The  stu- 

158 


HIGHER  EDUCATION  AND  PUBLIC  WELFARE 

dent  learns  that  he  is  in  the  midst  of  an  ordered  world. 
If  he  has  the  root  of  the  matter  in  him,  he  thereby  gains 
increasing  respect  for  that  order,  and  readiness  to  become 
himself  a  part  of  it.  It  was  the  idea  of  the  best  of  the 
ancient  philosophers  that  virtue  consisted  in  placing 
one's  self  in  harmony  with  the  universe.  To  him  whose 
idea  of  the  universe  is  narrow,  the  conception  of  such 
harmony  will  be  narrow  also.  The  one  broadens  with 
the  other.  And  if,  with  this  enlightened  study  of  nat- 
ural and  moral  law,  there  is  combined  at  the  same  time 
the  restraint  of  a  healthful  discipline  and  an  enforced 
regularity,  the  student  becomes  gradually  fitted  for  the 
highest  duty  of  citizensliip,  the  acceptance  of  self- 
imposed  burdens  in  the  interest  of  a  general  system  of 
moral  government. 

And  there  is  a  yet  higher  form  in  which  this  ideal 
may  be  realized.  The  duties  that  are  a  burden,  how- 
ever cheerfully  performed,  do  not  represent  our  full- 
est character  development ;  nor  is  the  man  who  does  his 
work  in  that  spirit  the  most  efficient  contributor  to  his 
country's  moral  welfare.  Far  better  is  it  if  the  per- 
formance of  civic  duty  can  be  the  result  of  an  inspira- 
tion which  makes  it  a  joy  and  not  a  task.  The  teacher 
who  is  fitted  for  his  calling  has  the  opportunity  to  im- 
part this  inspiration  through  the  study  of  great  works 
of  hterature  and  great  deeds  of  history.  There  may  be 
other  ways  in  wliich  his  contribution  to  the  well-being 
of  the  community  is  more  direct  and  obvious  ;  but  there 
is,  I  think,  no  way  in  which  he  can  really  do  so  much 
toward  bringing  out  what  is  best  in  a  nation.  The  boy 
or  man  who,  at  the  most  impressionable  period  of  his 
life,  lives  in  company  with  heroes,  whether  of  history  or 
of  fiction,  has  every  chance  to  realize  his  own  possibili- 
ties of  heroic  devotion.     Of  course  this  privilege,  like 

159 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

every  other,  can  be  abused.  There  will  be  some  who 
will  become  dreamers  instead  of  heroes,  —  who  will  take 
the  enjoyment  furnished  by  the  past,  and  give  nothing 
in  return.  But  fortunately,  the  atmosphere  in  our  bet- 
ter colleges  is  not  favorable  to  the  dreamer.  It  offers  a 
strong  stimulus  to  work.  This  work  may  not  always  be 
directed  on  the  lines  which  teachers,  or  even  parents, 
would  most  approve.  It  may  manifest  itself  on  the  foot- 
ball field  or  on  the  river  with  far  more  spontaneity  than 
in  the  classroom;  but  as  long  as  those  who  seek  their 
glory  in  athletic  sports  are  subjected  to  rigid  training 
rules,  we  need  have  little  fear  that  the  power  directed 
into  these  channels  will  prove  a  total  loss.  That  a 
university,  as  to-day  constituted,  gives  opportunities  for 
waste  of  time,  none  can  deny;  but  that  such  waste  is 
habitual  I  believe  no  one  who  has  studied  the  facts 
would  be  disposed  for  a  moment  to  admit.  If  what 
has  been  said  in  the  preceding  paragraphs  is  true,  those 
very  parts  of  our  collegiate  education  which  are  less 
immediately  practical,  and  which  seem  to  give  the  most 
opportunity  for  misdirected  energy,  are  the  ones  which 
have  their  highest  usefulness  in  the  preparation  for  the 
citizenship  of  the  commonwealth. 


160 


THE   DIRECTION  OF  AMERICAN 
UNIVERSITY  DEVELOPMENT 

Of  the  many  distinctive  features  of  American  life 
there  is  none  which  more  forcibly  strikes  a  keen 
observer  than  the  habit  of  private  munificence  in  the 
foundation  of  universities.  Other  aspects  may  seem 
more  noticeable  to  the  man  who  looks  only  at  the  sur- 
face, —  our  material  prosperity,  our  fertility  in  mechan- 
ical invention,  our  progress  in  business  organization, 
our  achievements  in  applying,  on  a  large  scale,  the 
principle  of  political  equality.  But  none  of  these  things 
has  the  fundamentally  distinctive  character  which  is 
possessed  by  our  system  of  university  endowment. 
Each  is  but  the  reproduction  on  broader  lines  of  things 
which  the  Old  World  has  done  before,  and  still  is 
doing.  Our  system  of  higher  education  has  character- 
istics of  its  own.  The  European  observer  has  been 
accustomed  to  see  colleges  that  were  founded  under 
ecclesiastical  control,  and  colleges  that  were  founded 
under  political  control.  He  finds  in  the  experiences  of 
older  countries  a  counterpart,  more  or  less  complete,  to 
the  early  history  of  Harvard  and  of  Yale,  of  the  Uni- 
versity of  Michigan  or  the  University  of  California. 
But  he  can  find  no  parallel  in  Europe  to  our  great 
movement  of  the  last  forty  years  toward  the  private 
endowment  of  free  educational  institutions,  —  that  move- 
ment which  has  resulted  in  the  establishment  of  Cor- 
11  161 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

nell,  of  Johns  Hopkins,  and  of  Chicago ;  that  movement 
which  has,  by  its  indirect  influence,  modified  the  char- 
acter of  other  institutions,  so  that  the  old  denomina- 
tional and  partisan  control  has  become  in  many  cases  a 
thing  of  the  past. 

It  is  now  more  than  thirty  years  since  this  series  of 
foundations  began.  Their  extent  and  their  success 
have  more  than  realized  the  expectations  of  the  most 
sanguine.  The  number  and  magnitude  of  private  gifts 
to  higher  education  increases  year  by  year.  The  insti- 
tutions founded  by  these  gifts  have  had  careers  of  great 
prosperity;  and  each,  as  it  in  turn  attains  its  majority, 
can  point  with  satisfaction  to  the  honorable  realization 
of  the  general  purpose  with  which  it  was  created.  But 
the  specific  direction  which  has  been  taken  by  these 
institutions  has  been  in  many  respects  different  from 
what  was  expected.  It  was  confidently  predicted  that 
the  results  of  these  endowments  would  show  themselves 
in  one  of  three  ways :  either  by  an  increased  populariza- 
tion of  learning,  which  should  make  the  university  thus 
founded  a  vast  lyceum;  or  by  a  development  of  new 
facilities  for  technical  training,  which  should  equip  the 
student  to  make  a  better  living  by  modern  methods 
than  he  could  by  old  ones ;  or,  by  the  establishment  of 
more  numerous  places  for  the  endowment  of  scientific 
research  and  discovery,  where  a  relatively  small  number 
of  specialists  should  be  encouraged  to  prosecute,  in 
learned  isolation,  those  studies  whose  results  should 
form  a  basis  for  the  progress  of  mankind. 

Not  one  of  these  three  ideals  has  been  realized.  On 
the  contrary,  the  education  furnished  by  the  colleges 
and  universities  under  new  methods  of  endowment  has 
been  singularly  like  that  which  was  given  by  many  of 
the  older  institutions.     Not  that  the  new  universities 

162 


AMERICAN  UNIVERSITY  DEVELOPMENT 

have  slavishly  patterned  their  methods  and  courses 
upon  those  of  their  predecessors;  but  that  all  institu- 
tions, new  or  old,  ecclesiastical,  political,  or  springing 
from  private  endowment,  have  been  compelled  by  force 
of  circumstances  to  approximate  toward  a  common  type 
more  or  less  independent  of  the  wishes  of  those  who 
established  and  controlled  them. 

That  this  process  has  been  on  the  whole  a  salutary 
one  I  think  there  can  be  no  doubt.  Whether  the 
founders  of  these  several  institutions  foresaw  the  gen- 
eral lines  of  their  future  history  —  as  in  some  cases  they 
undoubtedly  did  —  or  whether  they  builded  better  than 
they  knew,  the  type  of  the  modern  American  university 
has  in  it  profounder  capacities  for  public  service  than 
would  be  furnished  by  any  lyceum  however  broad,  by 
any  group  of  technical  schools  however  practical,  or 
by  any  aggregation  of  scientific  specialists  however  dis- 
interested in  their  devotion  to  their  several  pursuits. 

It  is  the  purpose  of  this  address  to  discuss  these  three 
conceptions  of  a  university:  as  a  popularizer  of  knowl- 
edge, as  a  training  place  for  professional  experts,  and 
as  a  home  of  scientific  specialists ;  to  show  wherein  the 
modern  American  university  type  differs  from  each  and 
all  of  these  three ;  and  to  indicate  the  reasons  why  the 
type  which  has  thus  developed  itself  is  a  natural  out- 
growth of  the  profoundest  needs  of  the  American 
people. 

The  conception  that  the  American  university  reaches 
its  highest  usefulness  in  popularizing  knowledge  is  a 
favorite  one  in  many  quarters.  Those  who  look  at  the 
matter  in  this  way  reason  somewhat  as  follows:  It  is 
the  function  of  a  university  to  give  knowledge  of  sci- 
ence and  art.  The  exigencies  of  the  American  people, 
its   democratic   government,  its   theory  of  equality  of 

163 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

mankind,  require  that  such  knowledge  should  be  as 
widely  diffused  as  possible.  The  public  schools  are 
able  to  do  this  during  the  early  years  of  life  and  in  the 
more  elementary  branches  of  instruction.  The  univer- 
sity ought  to  do  this,  and  to  find  its  widest  scope  of 
usefulness  in  doing  this,  for  persons  in  more  advanced 
years  wishing  to  continue  liberal  studies  on  a  higher 
scale.  Those  who  hold  this  view  think  that  the  uni- 
versity, within  its  own  limits,  is  a  place  where  any 
man  can  pursue  any  subject  of  learning  which  he  de- 
sires ;  and  they  further  believe  that  it  should  go  outside 
its  own  limits,  and  furnish  lecture  courses  which  will 
bring  within  the  reach  of  the  whole  community  the 
results  of  most  modem  investigations  in  science,  in  art, 
and  in  history. 

Each  of  these  conceptions  has  in  it  much  that  is 
noble.  Each  is  good  in  its  own  place.  I  would  not 
for  one  moment  undervalue  the  zeal  of  those  who  strive 
to  supplement  the  deficiencies  of  early  training  by 
attendance  on  courses  of  lectures  at  the  univereity  or 
under  its  auspices;  but  I  should  be  disposed  to  warn 
them  and  to  warn  the  public  against  overestimating  the 
value  of  education  which  can  be  obtained  in  this  way. 
Speaking  broadly,  lectures  do  a  great  deal  less  good 
than  is  popularly  supposed.  Very  few  men  or  women 
gain  as  much  real  mental  benefit  by  hearing  a  lecture  as 
they  gain  by  reading  a  book.  The  personal  magnetism 
of  the  lecturer  carries  the  members  of  his  audience  with 
him,  and  leads  them  to  believe  that  they  possess  the 
real  knowledge  which  they  seek ;  but  this  belief  is  too 
often  a  delusion,  worse  than  useless  in  its  results.  In 
reading  a  book  or  a  magazine  the  serious  student  can 
stop  and  think  over  the  difficulties  as  they  arise,  in 
order  to  be  sure  that  he  understands  each  proposition 

164 


AMERICAN  UNIVERSITY  DEVELOPMENT 

before  he  passes  on  to  the  next.  It  is  true  that  he  has 
not  the  advantage  of  making  inquiry  of  the  author 
concerning  his  own  special  difficulties ;  but  the  superior 
chance  of  making  inquiry  of  himself  many  times  out- 
weighs the  inferior  chance  of  making  inquiry  of  another. 

It  is  a  misconception  to  regard  the  university  of 
to-day  as  being  primarily  a  centre  for  the  diifusion  of 
learning.  That  work  of  diffusion  is  mainly  done,  and, 
on  the  whole,  better  done,  by  the  printing-press.  What 
a  man  is  anxious  to  communicate  to  the  public  speedily 
he  now  puts  into  a  newspaper  or  magazine ;  what  he  is 
ready  to  communicate  to  the  public  deliberately  he  puts 
into  a  book.  In  either  case  he  lays  down  his  points 
just  as  clearly  as  he  possibly  can.  If  the  reader  cannot 
follow  them,  it  is  either  because  the  subject  is  too  diffi- 
cult for  him,  or  because  he  lacks  the  power  of  concen- 
trated attention  which  is  necessary  for  mastering  any 
abstruse  subject  whatever.  So  far  as  lectures  mask  the 
difficulties  of  the  topic  treated,  or  lead  people  to  expect 
others  to  do  the  work  of  riveting  their  attention,  instead 
of  relying  upon  themselves  for  this  prime  necessity,  so 
far  they  are  likely  to  prove  a  positive  harm.  The  true 
function  of  a  university  is  the  creation  of  knowledge 
rather  than  its  diffusion.  It  must  be  a  centre  of 
thought  where  old  and  young,  leaders  and  followers, 
are  working  together  in  a  common  line,  learning  those 
principles  and  making  those  discoveries  which  are  trans- 
mitted to  the  public  through  a  variety  of  agencies,  of 
which  the  lecture  platform  is  but  one,  and  in  no  wise 
the  most  important. 

Widely  different,  and  in  some  respects  sounder,  is 
the  position  of  those  who  regard  the  university  as  a 
group  of  schools  for  technical  training.  These  men 
recognize  the  force  of  all  that  has  been  said  concerning 

lfii5 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

the  necessity  of  class  work  and  the  value  of  hard  study 
by  men  organized  in  groups.  They  hold  that  this 
classroom  work  and  study  should  be  so  ordered  as  to 
give  the  utmost  advantage  to  those  who  are  fitting 
themselves  for  various  lines  of  professional  life.  They 
would  have  matters  so  arranged  that  in  the  briefest 
time  possible  a  man  might  become  an  able  lawyer,  or 
engineer,  or  physician;  they  would,  in  short,  offer 
facilities  whereby  a  man  should  learn  to  pursue  each 
important  calling  —  commercial,  manufacturing,  or  agri- 
cultural —  by  the  best  scientific  methods.  In  this  way, 
we  are  told,  the  efficiency  of  the  citizens  of  our  republic 
would  be  greatly  increased,  the  time  of  preparation  for 
their  lifework  would  be  kept  within  reasonable  limits, 
and  their  productivity,  whether  in  earning  a  living  for 
themselves  or  in  serving  those  about  them,  would  be 
raised  many  times  above  its  present  basis. 

All  this  is  doubtless  true ;  yet  it  does  not  represent 
the  whole  work  which  a  university  ought  to  do,  and 
perhaps  not  the  largest  part  of  it.  Consistently  carried 
out,  this  plan  tends  to  fit  a  man  to  take  his  place  as 
part  of  a  social  machine ;  it  does  not  educate  him  to  be 
a  fully  developed  citizen  of  a  commonwealth.  In  fact, 
its  effect  in  the  latter  respect  may  be  positively  bad. 
Education  which  is  too  exclusively  technical  exagger- 
ates the  tendency,  already  too  strong  at  the  present 
day,  to  measure  things  solely  by  their  commercial  value. 
Anything  which  tends  to  exalt  professional  skill  as  an 
ideal  in  education,  and  ignores  the  need  of  wider  ideals, 
both  in  intellect  and  character,  fails  to  train  a  race  of 
freemen.  I  would  not  for  one  moment  depreciate  the 
work  of  a  good  law  school  or  a  good  scientific  school,  of 
a  good  medical  college  or  a  good  agricultural  college ; 
but  I  would  insist  most  emphatically  that  a  college  of 

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AMERICAN  UNIVERSITY  DEVELOPMENT 

American  citizens  must  be  something  more  than  any 
of  these,  or  than  all  of  them  put  together. 

The  third  of  these  partial  or  imperfect  conceptions  of 
a  university  is  that  of  a  place  exclusively  devoted  to 
scientific  research.  Those  who  hold  this  view  have 
much  that  is  right  and  noble  in  their  ideal.  They 
understand  that  the  creation  of  knowledge  is  a  greater 
and  more  difiQcult  work  than  its  diffusion;  and  they 
recognize  the  duty  of  the  university  to  assume  this 
work,  with  all  the  difficulties  which  it  involves.  They 
also  have  the  merit,  doubly  important  in  these  days,  of 
insisting  on  non-commercial  standards.  They  would 
inculcate  the  pursuit  of  truth  for  its  own  sake,  inde- 
pendent of  the  question  of  its  economic  productivity  to 
the  student.  They  advocate  and  develop  one  of  the 
noblest  parts  of  university  life.  But,  in  spite  of  all 
this,  they  are  far  from  having  grasped  the  full  concep- 
tion of  what  universities  can  do  for  the  country.  The 
scientific  specialist,  so  long  as  he  remains  a  specialist, 
is  something  less  than  a  whole  man.  A  university 
whose  teaching  force  is  composed  of  such  specialists, 
and  which  stimulates  the  development  of  such  special- 
ists throughout  its  student  body,  is  imperfectly  fulfil- 
ling its  functions  in  training  the  coming  generation  for 
the  responsibilities  of  their  life.  It  is  simply  a  peculiar 
kind  of  technical  school;  exceptional  in  its  character, 
indeed,  because  it  teaches  its  students  to  make  dis- 
coveries instead  of  to  make  money,  but,  nevertheless, 
occupied  with  the  training  of  a  particular  class  rather 
than  with  the  education  of  the  body  politic.  Valuable 
as  are  the  services  of  that  class,  and  important  as  it  is 
to  endow  the  research  of  those  who  are  serving  the 
public  in  non-remunerative  lines,  we  cannot  regard 
the   scientific  specialist  as  the  consummate  flower   of 

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THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

American  oducation,  any  more  than  is  the  specialist  in 
law  or  in  medicine,  in  engineering  or  in  theology. 

The  most  profoundly  important  work  which  falls  to 
the  lot  of  the  American  citizen  is  his  work  of  guiding 
the  destinies  of  the  country.  It  is  at  once  his  greatest 
privilege  and  his  heaviest  duty.  If  we  train  the  mem- 
bers of  the  rising  generation  to  do  this  well,  all  other 
things  can  be  trusted  to  take  care  of  themselves.  If 
we  do  not  train  them  to  do  this  well,  no  amount  of  edu- 
cation in  other  lines  will  make  up  for  the  deficiency. 

The  founders  of  our  nation  saw  that  free  men  must 
have  the  knowledge  necessary  to  enable  them  to  use 
that  freedom  to  the  public  advantage.  The  American 
public  school  system  owes  its  origin  to  this  perception. 
It  was  intended  to  give  our  citizens  the  intelligence 
necessary  for  the  performance  of  their  political  duties. 
As  the  degree  of  enlightenment  necessary  for  the  fulfil- 
ment of  those  duties  has  increased,  the  scope  of  public 
school  education  has  also  widened.  But  we  are  grad- 
ually coming  to  perceive  that  we  need  a  change  in  the 
quality  of  our  training  even  more  than  in  its  quantity. 
Mere  intelligence  on  the  part  of  the  voters,  however 
great,  is  not  sufficient  to  secure  wise  administration  of 
the  affairs  of  the  country  as  a  whole.  Each  change  in 
industrial  and  political  methods  makes  it  clearer  that 
they  must  have  also  a  sense  of  trusteeship;  and  the 
training  of  this  sense  of  trusteeship  is  at  once  a  more 
difficult  and  a  more  important  thing  than  the  develop- 
ment of  mere  political  intelligence.  Without  this  sense 
we  can  have  no  public  sentiment,  in  the  true  meaning 
of  the  word.  Without  it  we  may  perhaps  be  capable 
of  dealing  with  small  things,  but  we  are  helpless  in  the 
presence  of  great  ones.  Without  it  we  find  ourselves 
each  year  less  competent  to  handle  either  our  industrial 

16S 


AMERICAN  UNIVERSITY  DEVELOPMENT 

or  our  political  problems  in  the  interest  of  the  common- 
wealth as  a  whole. 

The  task  of  creating  this  sense  of  trusteeship  is  so 
great  as  to  require  the  co-operation  of  many  agencies. 
But  there  is  no  one  part  of  our  national  life  where  there 
are  so  many  opportunities  for  its  development  as  in  our 
colleges  and  universities.  Their  members  are  still  at 
an  impressionable  age.  They  are  living  in  communi- 
ties, each  of  which  has  its  traditions,  its  collective 
sentiment,  and  its  loyalty  which  carries  the  individual 
outside  of  himself.  Here,  if  anywhere,  we  have  free- 
dom from  that  excessive  commercialism  which  domi- 
nates most  other  departments  of  American  life.  Here, 
if  anywhere,  we  have  the  opportunity  for  the  study  of 
those  things  which  are  broad  instead  of  those  which 
are  narrow,  of  things  which  are  permanent  instead  of 
those  which  are  transitory.  Here  we  have,  as  it  exists 
nowhere  else,  the  opportunity  to  make  men  acquire  the 
habit  of  thinking  and  living  in  an  atmosphere  purer 
than  that  of  their  own  selfish  interests. 

It  is  impossible  to  say  in  detail  exactly  what  studies 
and  arrangements  of  the  course  will  best  conduce  toward 
these  ends.  Different  men  and  different  localities  re- 
quire a  certain  degree  of  difference  in  the  education 
which  is  required  to  train  them  in  public  spirit.  It  is, 
however,  possible  to  lay  down  certain  general  principles 
which  are  of  service  in  this  respect,  and  whose  impor- 
tance is  gradually  being  recognized  by  leaders  of  higher 
education;  who,  starting  from  widely  divergent  stand- 
points, are  gradually  coming  nearer  one  another  in 
principles  and  in  practice. 

It  must  be  recognized,  in  the  first  place,  that  a  large 
part  of  the  education  which  is  obtained  by  the  students 
of  the  university  is  that  which  they  themselves  give  to 

169 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

one  another.  This  is  true  to  a  large  degree  in  matters 
of  intellect.  It  is  true  to  an  overwhelming  degree  in 
matters  of  sentiment  and  public  spirit.  However  great 
may  be  the  value  of  the  instruction  obtained  in  the 
classroom,  and  of  the  facilities  which  a  college  offers  by 
its  libraries  and  its  laboratories,  it  is  probable  that  only 
a  small  minority  of  the  students  fiads  its  chief  profit 
from  this  source.  The  thing  which  makes  college  life 
of  the  greatest  value  to  the  citizenship  of  the  country  is 
that  the  men  and  women  who  come  under  its  influence 
get  a  larger  acquaintance  with  different  types  of  char- 
acter and  with  different  lines  of  human  thought,  as 
exemplified  by  living  people.  Book  learning  alone 
tends  to  have  a  narrowing  effect  on  the  intellectual 
vision.  In  order  that  it  may  become  a  means  of  char- 
acter  building,  it  is  of  the  utmost  importance  that  it 
should  be  pursued  in  the  midst  of  a  community  with 
collective  interests  and  activities,  which  take  its  mem- 
bers outside  of  themselves.  Those  collegiate  authorities 
who  deem  their  responsibility  to  be  ended  when  they 
have  provided  books  and  apparatus,  lectures  and  classes, 
take  a  fatally  incomplete  view  of  their  duties.  Upon 
them  rests  the  further  responsibility  to  do  all  that  they 
can  to  preserve  the  traditions  and  sentiments  in  a  place 
of  which  they  themselves  are  the  permanent  population, 
amid  shifting  generations  of  students.  Upon  them 
rests  the  responsibility  for  the  preservation  of  standards 
of  public  order  in  the  community  about  them ;  for  the 
maintenance,  as  far  as  lies  in  their  power,  of  athletic 
purity  and  fairness  in  the  dealings  of  each  university 
with  its  rivals;  for  the  fullest  development  of  those 
religious  sentiments  of  reverence  and  self-devotion 
without  which  churches  are  powerless,  and  creeds  are 
but  empty  forms. 

170 


AMERICAN  UNIVERSITY  DEVELOPMENT 

In  order  that  our  collegiate  courses  should  thus 
furnish  means  of  mutual  education,  their  studies  must 
be  so  arranged  as  to  attract  the  kind  of  students  who 
are  capable  of  giving  this  education  to  one  another. 

For  this  there  is  one  prime  necessity,  without  which 
all  else  is  useless.  The  course  must  be  one  for  workers 
and  not  for  idlers.  It  must  furnish  hard  tasks,  not 
only  for  the  effect  of  those  tasks  upon  the  individual, 
but  still  more  for  their  effect  in  making  the  college 
a  place  for  students  who  are  not  afraid  of  difiBculties. 
Poor  as  was  the  curriculum  of  our  colleges  at  the  begin- 
ning of  the  century,  it  had  this  cardinal  merit,  that  it 
admitted  no  loafing.  The  men  who  lived  for  four  years 
in  its  atmosphere  might  obtain  a  narrow  conception  of 
learning,  and  go  forth  into  the  world  scantily  provided 
with  practical  equipment  for  the  details  of  life;  but 
they  had  obtained  that  habit  of  determination  in  the 
face  of  difiBculties  which  does  more  than  everything 
else  to  make  a  body  of  men  powerful  in  their  several 
spheres. 

The  problem  is  no  longer  so  simple  as  it  was  in  the 
days  of  the  early  New  England  colleges.  Modern 
educators  have  given  us  new  methods  of  teaching; 
modern  life  has  given  us  a  new  range  of  interests; 
modern  technical  training  claims  its  share  of  the  time 
of  the  student  in  his  collegiate  years  no  less  than  in  his 
years  of  professional  study.  We  must  see  to  it  that 
we  offer  our  students  the  benefit  of  all  these  things, 
without  sacrificing  those  fundamental  characteristics 
which  made  the  colleges  of  the  earlier  generation  great. 
Our  course  must  be  sufficiently  modern  to  attract  liv- 
ing men  and  women,  yet  it  must  not  deal  with  things 
so  exclusively  modern  that  it  is  a  distraction  instead  of 
a  means  of  cohesion.     It  must  deal  in  proper  proportion 

171 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

with  the  classic  literature  of  different  nations,  not 
simply  because  of  the  effect  of  those  classics,  whether 
ancient  or  modern,  in  forming  the  judgments  of  the 
students  themselves,  but  for  the  sake  of  attracting  a 
student  body  which  cares  for  something  profounder 
than  the  novel  or  drama  of  the  day,  for  something 
wider  than  the  present  in  literature,  in  art,  and  in  his- 
tory. Our  course  must  deal  with  matters  sufficiently 
practical  to  prevent  the  students  from  feeling  that  they 
have  wasted  their  time ;  but,  on  the  other  hand,  it  must 
avoid  the  far  greater  danger  of  becoming  so  exclusively 
practical  that  it  does  not  teach  theory.  It  must  admit 
of  a  sufficient  degree  of  specialization  to  allow  those 
students  for  whom  time  is  money  to  share  in  its  advan- 
tages as  a  basis  for  their  professional  careers;  but  if 
this  specialization  goes  so  far  as  to  make  the  course 
attractive  only  to  those  students  whose  interests  are 
special  rather  than  general,  and  to  confirm  them  in 
their  withdrawal  from  the  broader  aspects  of  life  in  the 
college  and  in  the  world,  so  far  does  it  defeat  our 
purpose  of  training  citizens  in  public  spirit. 

Finally,  in  the  later  years  of  university  life,  when 
the  foundations  of  general  interest  have  been  laid,  and 
specialized  work  of  professional  preparation  has  become 
the  dominant  aim,  we  must  see  to  it  that  the  students 
are  educated  in  broad  aspects  of  professional  action 
rather  than  narrow  ones.  It  is  a  mistake,  on  every 
ground,  if  a  school  makes  its  work  a  mere  anticipation 
of  the  teaching  of  the  office  or  the  shop;  for  in  after 
life  the  things  which  it  thus  teaches  generally  have  to 
be  learned  over  again,  while  the  things  which  it  thereby 
fails  to  teach  are  generally  not  learned  at  all. 

In  thus  emphasizing  the  broad  instead  of  the  narrow 
sides  of  professional  study,  and  the  importance  of  train- 

172 


AMERICAN  UNIVERSITY  DEVELOPMENT 

ing  in  theory  rather  than  training  in  practice,  I  do  not 
for  one  moment  mean  to  depreciate  the  value  of  the 
work  which  is  done  in  laboratories,  in  individual  inves- 
tigations, and  in  all  those  things  which  make  a  man 
master  of  the  applications  of  the  science  or  art  which 
he  is  studying.  But  they  should  be  regarded  as  appli- 
cations rather  than  primary  objects.  The  laboratory 
should  be  a  thought-shop  rather  than  a  workshop.  It 
should  be  an  auxiliary  to  the  understanding  of  prin- 
ciples rather  than  a  preparation  for  the  doing  of  details. 
So  soon  as  the  man  values  the  shopwork  for  its  own 
sake,  rather  than  as  a  means  of  education,  he  starts 
on  the  wrong  road.  One  of  the  ablest  and  largest 
employers  of  labor  in  the  transportation  industries  of 
the  country  has  said  that  there  is  no  evil  so  hard  to 
correct  as  that  overvaluation  of  mere  mechanical  work 
to  which  some  of  the  misdirected  professional  schools 
conduce.  Nor  does  the  harm  stop  with  the  individual. 
It  affects  his  attitude  toward  his  fellow  men.  It  tends 
to  make  the  professions  of  our  country  mechanical  in 
their  worst  sense,  reducing  their  members  to  the  level 
of  parts  of  a  machine,  instead  of  raising  them  to  their 
responsibilities  as  independent  members  of  a  body 
politic. 

There  was  a  time,  not  so  many  years  ago,  when  these 
great  principles  seemed  in  peril  of  being  forgotten; 
when  there  was  danger  that  general  training  would  be 
sacrificed  to  technical  training ;  that  breadth  would  give 
place  to  specialization ;  and  that,  in  the  furtherance  of 
the  education  given  by  professors  in  their  classrooms, 
we  should  neglect  to  consider  that  wider  education 
given  by  the  students  to  one  another.  But  with  the 
problems  which  have  been  forced  upon  us  as  a  nation, 
we  have  come  to  consider  more  seriously  the  means 

173 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

which  are  needed  to  meet  them ;  and  the  result  of  that 
consideration  is  showing  itself  in  the  direction  of  uni- 
versity development  to-day.  Without  sacrificing  their 
thoroughness,  the  older  colleges  have  expanded  their 
sphere  of  interest  Without  sacrificing  their  character 
as  public  institutions,  the  state  universities  have  allowed 
new  sentiments  and  traditions  to  grow  about  them. 
The  recent  private  foundations,  under  wise  and  able 
leadership,  have  striven  with  marked  success  to  select 
what  was  best  in  either  type,  and  to  add  their  own  con- 
tribution thereto.  Now,  as  never  before,  the  leaders 
of  college  education  in  this  country,  while  differing  in 
the  detail  of  their  methods,  are  animated  by  a  common 
purpose.  It  is  not  enough  for  them  to  popularize  learn- 
ing, to  train  professional  experts,  or  even  to  furnish 
laboratories  for  scientific  research.  All  these  things 
they  do;  but  all  these  things  they  use  as  a  means  to 
the  greater  end  of  training  the  citizens  of  the  republic 
to  assume  the  new  trusts  and  obligations  which  the 
future  has  in  store.  Not  in  the  promotion  of  different 
churches,  not  in  the  development  of  different  sections, 
not  even  in  the  elevation  of  different  callings,  do  our 
universities  place  their  ideal ;  but  in  the  service  of  one 
learning,  of  one  country,  and  of  one  God. 


174 


FUNDAMENTAL  KEQUIREMENTS  IN 
SCHOOL  EDUCATION 

Fkom  the  time  of  De  Quincey  onward,  it  has  been  a 
familiar  thought  that  good  teaching  aims  at  two  distinct 
objects:  the  imparting  of  knowledge  and  the  evoking 
of  power.  Only  when  it  combines  both  these  achieve- 
ments can  a  school  system  claim  to  have  accomplished 
its  purpose.  It  should  give  its  pupils,  before  they  go 
out  into  practical  life,  sufficient  knowledge  to  enable 
them  to  move  intelligently  among  the  men  and  things 
which  surround  them,  and  sufficient  power  to  use  that 
knowledge  in  the  various  emergencies  which  are  likely 
to  arise. 

The  old  educational  system  was  almost  entirely  occu- 
pied with  the  production  of  power.  Whatever  knowl- 
edge it  imparted  was  incidental,  and  was  confined 
within  very  narrow  lines.  Every  boy  or  girl  was  ex- 
pected to  learn  the  three  R's,  —  reading,  writing  and 
arithmetic.  If  the  school  children  of  past  generations 
pursued  their  studies  faithfully,  they  found  themselves 
equipped  with  these  three  tools  of  trade,  and  with  little 
else.  If,  in  the  course  of  their  efforts  to  learn  to  read, 
they  had  caught  some  knowledge  of  history  or  science 
or  literature,  this  was  a  fortunate  accident,  in  which 
they  had  the  advantage  of  most  of  their  fellows.  Even 
if  they  went  on  from  school  to  college,  the  same  narrow- 
ness of   training  was  continued.     Their  time  was  de- 

175 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

voted  chiefly  to  classics  and  mathematics,  with  a  little 
metaphysics,  —  all  valuable  as  exercises  for  the  mind ; 
all  capable,  in  the  hands  of  a  good  teacher,  of  helping 
the  student  to  obtain  power  of  expression  for  his 
thoughts;  but  all  conveying  very  slight  knowledge  of 
literature,  still  less  of  art,  and  none  of  modern  science." 

Within  the  last  fifty  years  there  has  been  a  reaction. 
Our  discoveries  in  the  world  of  nature  have  been  so 
important  that  they  have  secured  increasing  recognition 
of  their  results  in  school  courses.  This  widened  study 
of  modern  science  has  been  attended  by  an  increased 
attention  to  modern  literature  also.  The  pupils  have 
been  given  the  opportunity  to  know  things  which  were 
worth  knowing,  and  to  read  things  which  were  worth 
reading.  This  movement  has  resulted  not  only  in  the 
addition  of  new  subjects  of  study,  but  in  a  radical 
change  of  method  of  teaching  the  old  ones.  Arithmetic 
or  geography,  as  now  handled,  is  a  very  different  thing 
from  what  it  was  fifty  years  ago.  It  is  full  of  illustra- 
tion adapted  to  the  needs  and  interests  of  each  child.  It 
is  rendered  pleasant  and  easy  instead  of  hard.  These 
tendencies  have  made  themselves  felt  alike  in  the  col- 
leges and  the  high  schools,  the  grammar  schools  and 
the  kindergartens.  In  place  of  a  curriculum  designed 
for  mental  discipline,  through  which  all  were  compelled 
to  pass,  we  have  an  educational  system  intended  to 
give  knowledge  and  the  enjoyment  connected  with  the 
acquirement  of  knowledge;  taking  account  of  the  vari- 
ous tastes  of  children  in  the  successive  stages  of  their 
progress,  and  branching,  at  a  comparatively  early  date, 
into  an  elective  system,  whereby  each  student  can  choose 
those  subjects  which  he  most  needs  or  appreciates. 

There  can  be  no  doubt  that  this  reaction  from  the 
excessive  narrowness  of  the  old-fashioned  courses  of 

176 


FUNDAMENTAL  REQUIREMENTS  IN  EDUCATION 

study  has  been  in  many  ways  a  salutary  thing.  We 
may,  however,  fairly  raise  the  question  whether  it  has 
not  gone  too  far;  whether,  in  meeting  the  increased 
demands  for  knowledge,  we  are  not  sacrificing  the 
assurance  of  training  in  power;  whether  a  generation 
of  children  which  has  been  taught  to  read  a  few  inter- 
esting works  of  literature  and  to  know  a  number  of 
important  facts  in  natural  science,  but  which  is  not 
over-strong  in  arithmetic  and  is  distinctly  weak  in 
spelling,  is  quite  so  well  educated  as  it  claims  to  be. 
In  asking  this  question  we  do  not  cast  ridicule  on 
modern  methods  of  teaching.  Some  of  those  who  are 
to-day  propounding  it  most  seriously  are  the  very  men 
who  twenty  years  ago  were  most  active  in  the  introduc- 
tion of  these  methods.  Just  because  they  understand 
the  need  of  a  really  liberal  education,  they  feel  the 
necessity  of  seeing  that  this  education  shall  be  placed 
upon  a  solid  basis.  They  are  not  arguing  against  giv- 
ing modern  classics,  especially  those  in  our  own  lan- 
guage, a  full  recognition  side  by  side  with  ancient 
classics,  nor  against  letting  modern  science  take  the 
place  of  ancient  philosophy;  but  they  are  arguing  for 
such  care  in  the  introduction  of  these  changes  and  in 
the  pursuit  of  these  studies  as  shall  prevent  them  from 
becoming  a  mere  distraction  and  shall  allow  them  to 
remain  a  discipline. 

There  is  good  reason  to  raise  a  voice  of  warning 
against  one-sided  absorption  in  modern  educational 
ideals,  to  the  exclusion  of  everything  else.  We  are  in 
the  presence  of  a  combination  of  causes  which  produce 
a  real  danger  that  our  teachers  will  lay  too  much  stress 
on  knowledge  and  too  little  on  power. 

In  the  first  place,  the  pupils,  with  few  exceptions, 
enjoy  being  taught  knowledge,  and  do  not  enjoy  being 
12  177 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

taught  power.  The  teaching  of  knowledge  satisfies 
their  curiosity;  and  anything  which  satisfies  curiosity 
is  a  pleasure  to  the  average  child  no  less  than  to  the 
average  adult.  The  teaching  of  power  fatigues  their 
mind;  and  the  average  child  dislikes  mental  fatigue 
almost  as  much  as  the  average  grown  person.  There  is 
an  apparent  spontaneity  in  the  study  of  facts,  especially 
when  it  is  varied  to  suit  the  immediate  tastes  of  the 
children.  There  is  an  apparent  irksomeness  in  the 
study  of  principles  which  are  intended  to  give  future 
power.  It  too  often  happens  that  the  active  and  enter- 
prising teacher,  who  desires  spontaneous  manifestations 
of  life  on  the  part  of  his  pupils,  is  thus  led  to  give 
undue  preference  to  the  less  important  part  of  his  work. 
In  the  next  place,  the  teacher  likes  to  see  tangible 
results;  and  the  imparting  of  knowledge  gives  those 
results.  When  a  pupil  has  mastered  a  fact,  this  can 
be  made  evident  immediately;  while  it  takes  days  and 
weeks  to  be  sure  that  he  has  mastered  a  principle. 
Moreover,  the  teacher,  unless  he  be  a  very  exceptional 
person,  is  likely  to  overestimate  the  amount  which  he 
has  achieved  when  he  has  taught  the  child  a  few  facts. 
He  thinks  that  he  has  trained  the  attention  of  the 
pupil,  when  really  he  has  only  given  that  pupil  things 
which  he  liked,  and  made  him  less  capable  rather  than 
more  capable  of  attending  to  things  which  he  does  not 
like.  Many  a  student  in  our  modem  schools  has  been 
simply  stuffed  with  the  sugar  plums  of  education.  By 
offering  a  child  a  pound  of  candy  you  can  very  rapidly 
increase  his  weight  by  one  pound,  and  can  produce  all 
the  external  symptoms  of  a  vigorous  appetite ;  but  any 
sensible  man  or  woman  knows  that  the  weight  thus 
gained  is  transient,  and  the  appetite  thus  evoked  worse 
than  illusory. 

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FUNDAMENTAL  REQUIREMENTS  IN  EDUCATION 

Uufortunately,  there  are  a  great  many  people  who 
are  not  sensible  in  judging  educational  effects ;  and 
these  people  aid  and  abet  the  teachers  in  their  desire 
to  show  tangible  results  in  the  form  of  gratified  curios- 
ity and  acquired  knowledge.  The  parents  are  pleased 
to  have  the  pupils  interested  in  their  studies.  The 
committees  are  pleased  to  have  the  pupils  acquainted 
with  so  many  facts  of  modern  life.  Not  until  the  value 
of  studies  is  tested  by  their  effects  upon  working 
efficiency  does  the  public  find  how  imperfectly  it  has 
measured  the  relative  importance  of  different  kinds  of 
education. 

This  test  begins  to  come  as  soon  as  pupils  pass  from 
schools  of  a  lower  grade  to  those  of  a  higher.  It  is  too 
often  found  that  the  studies  which  have  aroused  the 
greatest  immediate  interest  and  attention  are  bad  rather 
than  good  as  a  preparation  for  further  pursuit  of  school 
work.  The  high  school  feels  this  in  taking  students 
from  the  common  school ;  the  college  feels  it  in  taking 
students  from  the  high  school.  While  the  teachers 
who  have  charge  of  the  pupil  at  an  earlier  age  are 
pressing  for  variety  of  studies  and  knowledge  of  many 
kinds,  those  who  have  charge  of  these  pupils  in  sub- 
sequent years  are  disposed  to  insist  on  the  necessity  of 
stricter  previous  training  in  a  relatively  small  number 
of  fields.  They  see  that  much  which  is  regarded  as  a 
variety  of  intellectual  stimulus  is  really  a  sort  of  in- 
tellectual dissipation;  and  they  say  that  those  pupils 
alone  are  prepared  to  go  on  with  higher  studies  who 
have  learned  to  do  hard  work  without  the  artificial 
stimulus  incident  to  such  dissipation. 

It  is  quite  possible  that  the  teachers  in  our  colleges 
are  wrong  in  lajdng  too  much  stress  on  the  preparatory 
side  of  the  high  school  course ;   for  the   majority  of 

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THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

pupils  in  high  schools  do  not  and  cannot  enter  college. 
It  is  in  like  manner  possible  that  the  high  school  teachers 
are  wrong  in  insisting  that  the  grammar  school  studies 
should  be  arranged  with  a  view  toward  preparation  for 
high  school  needs ;  for  only  a  part  of  our  grammar 
school  pupils  can  ever  hope  to  attend  the  high  school. 
But  it  is  quite  certainly  an  error  to  go  to  the  opposite 
extreme ;  to  say  that  the  grammar  school  course  must 
be  so  arranged  as  to  give  the  maximum  development 
and  enjoyment  to  the  grammar  school  pupil,  and  that 
the  high  schools  must  arrange  to  fit  their  work  upon  it ; 
or  to  say  that  the  high  school  course  must  be  adapted 
to  the  general  needs  of  high  school  pupils  alone,  and 
that  the  colleges  must  take  as  a  preparation  for  their 
students  the  thing  which  proves  best  for  those  who 
are  not  going  to  be  their  students.  We  may  as  well 
recognize  the  fact  that  there  is  a  real  conflict  of  inter- 
ests, in  each  grade,  between  the  pupils  who  are  not 
going  any  further  and  those  who  are.  If  a  pupil, 
whether  in  the  grammar  school  or  the  high  school,  is 
near  the  end  of  his  course  of  study,  he  doubtless  needs 
to  get  a  good  deal  of  descriptive  science  at  that  point ; 
because  if  he  does  not  get  it  then,  he  probably  never 
will  get  it  at  all,  and  in  this  age  of  the  world  no  one 
can  be  called  educated  who  has  not  some  general  knowl- 
edge of  science.  But  if  some  other  pupil  who  is  laying 
the  foundation  for  years  of  subsequent  study  is  thus 
allowed  to  substitute  descriptive  science  for  arithmetic, 
or  algebra,  or  trigonometry,  according  to  the  stage  of 
development  which  he  may  have  reached,  it  is  not 
simply  a  waste  of  time  ;  it  may  readily  prove  a  positive 
harm.  Many  a  boy  has  suffered  actual  injury  by  study- 
ing too  extensively  into  the  phenomena  of  force  before 
he  has  mastered    the   mathematical  principles   which 

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FUNDAMENTAL  REQUIREMENTS  IN  EDUCATION 

regulate  them.  His  apparent  knowledge  of  fact,  com- 
bined with  a  real  ignorance  of  underlying  principle,  has 
produced  in  his  mind  such  an  inversion  of  the  true 
order  of  things,  and  destroyed  so  much  his  power  of 
really  reasoning  about  those  things,  that  it  proves  a 
handicap  for  many  years  afterward.  Nor  is  it  in  theoret- 
ical studies  alone  that  these  difficulties  and  losses  are 
felt.  Leading  employers  of  labor  in  the  more  complex 
branches  of  mechanical  engineering  tell  me  that  those 
students  who  have  allowed  their  laboratory  practice  to 
degenerate  into  shop  work,  and  who  have  treated  their 
experiments  in  the  scientific  school  not  as  means  of 
mastering  principles,  but  as  things  valuable  in  their 
own  sake,  have  almost  fatally  undermined  their  power 
of  rising  to  the  higher  walks  of  the  profession. 

In  like  manner  it  is  of  great  consequence  that  the 
pupils  in  every  stage  of  school  life  should  have  as 
much  knowledge  of  literature  as  our  teachers  can  give 
them  ;  but  if  those  who  are  expecting  to  pursue  literary 
studies  in  connection  with  their  professional  work  — 
whether  in  the  ministry,  the  law,  or  the  field  of  journal- 
ism —  allow  their  enjoyment  of  books  to  interfere  with 
accurate  study  of  expression,  and  with  that  mastery  of 
language  which  can  only  be  obtained  by  hard  work  over 
individual  words,  we  have  purchased  a  small  gain  at 
an  incalculable  price. 

Ruskin  has  said  —  nor  is  he  alone  in  saying  it  —  that 
the  apparent  culmination  of  the  art  of  a  people  is  the 
beginning  of  its  decadence.  When  a  school  of  artists 
begins  to  branch  out  into  the  full  enjoyment  of  its 
powers,  it  indicates  that  the  underlying  development  of 
power  is  drawing  near  to  its  close.  This  analogy  holds 
good,  to  a  large  degree,  in  the  life  history  of  each  indi- 
vidual.    That  stage  of  education  where  the  boy  or  girl 

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THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

is  allowed  to  reap  the  largest  tangible  fruits  in  the 
way  of  enjoyment  of  science  and  literature  seems  to 
be,  in  nine  cases  out  of  ten,  precisely  the  time  when 
hold  on  concentrated  power  is  being  relaxed  instead  of 
tightened. 

An  illustration  from  another  field  of  education,  which 
is  not  officially  recognized  as  part  of  our  school  system, 
will  serve  to  make  this  point  clearer.  The  inexperi- 
enced trainer  who  attempts  to  develop  a  football  team 
usually  begins  by  teaching  his  men  an  extensive  knowl- 
edge of  the  game.  He  shows  them  formations  which 
they  can  employ  and  tricks  which  they  can  practise. 
Those  formations  and  those  tricks  will  cause  them  to 
win  against  inexperienced  opponents.  But  after  a  few 
days  of  that  kind  of  play  they  will  find  that  they  have 
reached  the  limit  of  their  development;  that  they  can- 
not go  on,  and  are  almost  sure  to  fall  back.  On  the 
other  hand,  the  experienced  coach  or  captain  will,  in 
the  first  days  of  his  season,  teach  his  men  to  play  foot- 
ball, —  clean,  straight,  hard,  uninteresting  football.  Not 
until  a  few  days  before  the  final  trial  will  he  teach  those 
details  of  formation  which  to  the  student  of  the  game 
are  matters  of  such  surpassing  interest.  So  well  known 
has  this  principle  become  that  the  success  or  failure  of 
a  team  during  its  season  is  dependent  on  the  observance 
or  non-observance  of  this  principle.  The  teaching  of 
details  must  be  reserved  for  the  culminating  stage  of 
training,  instead  of  being  advanced  to  the  prepara- 
tory one. 

It  will  perhaps  be  said  that  these  suggestions  are 
vague  and  general,  and  that  they  need  to  be  made 
much  more  specific  before  they  can  be  put  into  practice. 
I  acknowledge  the  justice  of  this  objection.  What  has 
been  thus  far  said  is  intended  to  afford  a  point  of  view 

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FUNDAMENTAL  REQUIREMENTS  IN  EDUCATION 

rather  than  to  present  a  detailed  scheme  of  education. 
But  there  are  certain  practical  consequences  that  follow 
the  adoption  of  this  point  of  view  which  are  sufficiently- 
clear  to  be  formulated  in  detail. 

One  of  these  has  already  been  plainly  implied.  If 
the  views  thus  far  advanced  are  correct,  we  must,  in 
the  educational  scheme  of  the  future,  look  forward  to 
a  separation  of  groups  of  students,  not  so  much  on  the 
line  of  their  different  tastes  as  on  the  line  of  probable 
duration  of  the  educational  course.  I  am  aware  that 
this  idea  is  not  in  harmony  with  the  general  tendency 
of  the  moment.  That  tendency  is  to  have  the  students 
divided  into  groups  according  to  their  different  mental 
tastes.  In  those  colleges  which  have  the  elective  sys- 
tem this  idea  is  completely  carried  out.  In  the  high 
schools  it  is  being  developed  to  a  considerable  degree. 
There  is  a  demand  in  certain  quarters  for  its  introduc- 
tion into  the  grammar  schools.  But  the  difficulties  and 
the  evils  attendant  upon  this  movement  have  become 
so  manifest  that  voices  are  being  everywhere  raised  in 
protest  against  its  further  extension.  It  is  seen  that 
the  apparent  tastes  of  the  pupil,  at  any  rate  in  the 
earlier  stages  of  his  education,  are  a  very  unsafe  guide 
in  determining  what  education  he  really  requires.  I 
am  inclined  to  think  that  different  kinds  of  pupils  in 
our  secondary  schools  need  not  so  much  an  opportunity 
to  pursue  different  groups  of  studies  as  an  opportunity 
to  pursue  the  same  group  in  different  ways;  the  differ- 
ence being  determined  by  the  question  whether  the 
course  in  any  subject  is  intended  to  be  a  finishing 
course  or  a  preparation  for  something  more  thorough. 
In  the  former  case  it  will  need  to  be  made  as  extensive 
as  possible,  with  a  view  of  imparting  the  necessary 
minimum  of  knowledge.     In  the  latter  case  it  will  need 

183 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

to  be  made  as  intensive  as  possible,  in  order  that  the 
student  may  attain  that  maximum  of  power  which  shall 
enable  him  sucessfully  to  use  and  apply  the  knowl- 
edge which  he  will  subsequently  acquire.  Take  a 
concrete  instance  from  our  experience  in  teaching  law 
to  college  classes.  It  is  extremely  desirable  that  our 
graduates,  as  they  go  out  into  the  world,  shall  have  a 
general  knowledge  of  legal  principles  and  their  applica- 
tions to  problems  which  confront  the  citizen.  It  is 
possible  in  a  course  of  two  or  three  hours  per  week  to 
give  the  student  this  general  knowledge.  To  the  man 
who  does  not  expect  to  be  a  lawyer  this  is  invaluable. 
But  to  the  man  who  looks  forward  to  the  law  as  a 
career  it  has  surprisingly  little  use.  The  whole  matter 
has  from  the  necessities  of  the  case  been  so  superficially 
dealt  with  that  no  foundation  is  given  for  the  closer 
and  more  thorough  study  which  is  required  of  the 
specialist.  To  reach  the  needs  of  these  two  distinct 
sets  of  men  we  have  to  arrange  two  courses  of  instruc- 
tion, —  one  broad  and  relatively  superficial,  the  other 
narrow  and  profound.  Such  a  separation  doubtless  has 
its  inconveniences ;  and  it  may  well  be  that  these  incon- 
veniences are  greater  in  the  schools  than  in  the  colleges. 
But  I  think  there  can  be  no  question  that  it  would  be 
salutary  in  its  effects,  both  on  those  who  were  complet- 
ing their  school  course  and  upon  those  who  still  had 
years  of  study  before  them.  And  if  it  is  thus  salutary, 
its  adoption  as  a  principle  will  in  the  long  run  produce 
economy  rather  than  waste. 

In  the  next  place  a  very  heavy  duty  rests  upon  those 
in  charge  of  our  high  schools  and  colleges  so  to  arrange 
their  examinations  that  teachers  in  the  earlier  stages  of 
the  educational  system  will  be  helped  rather  than  hin- 
dered in  their  efforts  to  insist  on  the  necessity  of  train- 

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FUNDAMENTAL  REQUIREMENTS  IN  EDUCATION 

ing  for  future  work.  Entrance  examinations  should  be 
made  tests  of  the  power  to  go  on  with  what  is  before 
the  pupils  rather  than  tests  of  acquirement  in  what  is 
behind  them.  With  the  pressure  that  is  placed  upon 
our  common  school  teachers  to  secure  immediate  results 
—  pressure  coming  alike  from  their  pupils,  from  their 
own  ambitions,  and  from  the  outside  public  —  the  very 
least  that  the  authorities  in  schools  of  higher  grade  can 
do  is  to  lend  their  aid  in  resisting  such  tendencies. 
Above  all  things,  let  us  not  yield  to  the  fallacy  that  a 
great  amount  of  knowledge  can  be  allowed  to  make 
good  a  deficiency  of  power  as  an  indication  of  fitness  to 
proceed  further.  The  boy  or  girl  who  knows  many 
things  superficially  and  nothing  systematically  had  bet- 
ter be  advised  to  go  out  into  practical  life  at  once. 
The  subsequent  school  life  of  such  a  boy  or  girl  is 
likely  to  be  illusory  in  its  benefits.  The  college  course 
which  attracts  such  persons  operates  as  an  incentive  to 
waste  of  time.  Students  of  this  type  are  the  ones  who 
bring  upon  our  colleges  the  reproach  of  inefficiency; 
and  those  colleges  who,  by  their  methods  of  admission 
and  instruction,  lay  themselves  open  to  this  reproach, 
are  guilty  of  the  gravest  dereliction  of  their  duty. 

In  whatever  studies  we  may  select  for  our  school 
course,  we  should  lay  emphasis  on  training  in  principles 
rather  than  on  attention  to  details. 

Modern  educational  authorities  insist  that  teachers 
should  be  as  concrete  as  possible  in  all  their  statements, 
and  should  enforce  them  by  illustrations  which  will 
appeal  to  the  imagination.  This  concreteness  has  great 
value  in  its  proper  place ;  but  it  may  sometimes  be  car- 
ried too  far.  In  many  cases  the  illustration  is  the  one 
thing  that  remains  in  the  mind  of  the  child,  and  the 
principle  which  it  is  intended  to  develop  is  lost  sight 

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THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

of.  The  pupil's  natural  tendency  to  lay  stress  on 
accessories  and  incidents  is  so  great  that  it  needs  no 
artificial  encouragement.  I  can  testify  personally  that, 
though  I  spent  nearly  a  year  in  the  study  of  Arnold's 
Latin  Prose  Composition,  the  salient  facts  which  re- 
main in  my  mind  are  that  Balbus  built  a  wall,  and  that 
it  makes  no  difference  to  Balbus  whether  he  drinks 
wine  or  water;  while  the  methods  of  translating  these 
things  into  Latin  have  passed  wholly  out  of  mind.  I 
can  also  state  from  experience  that  three  men  of  my 
own  age,  who  compared  their  recollections  of  Green- 
leaf's  Common  School  Arithmetic,  all  remembered  that 
A.  Atwood  can  hoe  a  certain  field  in  ten  days,  and  with 
the  assistance  of  his  son  Jerry  can  hoe  it  in  seven  days, 
and  with  the  assistance  of  his  son  Jacob  can  hoe  it  in 
six  days ;  and  that  the  further  question  was  asked  how 
long  it  would  take  Jerry  and  Jacob  to  hoe  it  together; 
but  what  the  answer  was  to  that  question,  or  what  were 
the  means  by  which  the  answer  was  obtained,  were 
things  of  which  they  professed  no  recollection. 

The  true  function  of  the  concrete  illustration  in  arith- 
metic or  in  any  other  study  is  like  that  of  the  concrete 
experiment  in  physics.  Whether  it  is  a  help  or  a 
hindrance  to  teaching  will  depend  upon  the  spirit  in 
which  it  is  used.  Attention  to  the  detail  of  the  illus- 
tration is  good  up  to  a  certain  point ;  beyond  that  point 
it  causes  the  illustration  to  be  remembered  for  its  own 
sake,  and  not  for  the  sake  of  what  it  proves.  A  mere 
difference  of  emphasis,  repeated  fifty  times  a  day,  will 
make  all  the  difference  between  good  teaching  and  bad 
teaching.  Many  a  time  have  I  gone  into  a  primary 
school  and  heard  the  question,  "  Two  apples  and  three 
apples  make  how  many  apples  ?  "  In  dealing  with  the 
subject  of  the  sentence  the  stress  upon  apples  is  allow- 

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FUNDAMENTAL  REQUIREMENTS  IN  EDUCATION 

able  enough ;  but  in  the  predicate  the  legitimate  thing 
to  emphasize  is  the  phrase  "how  many,"  and  any 
departure  from  this  emphasis  is  bad  teaching.  It  leads 
the  child  to  think  too  much  of  the  apples  and  too  little 
of  the  number.  The  temptation  to  make  this  mistake 
is  strong,  because  the  child  cares  more  about  apples 
than  it  does  about  numbers;  but  the  consequence  of 
this  misdirected  attention  is  a  diversion  from  the  under- 
lying principle  involved.  The  real  teaching  is  not 
nearly  so  great  in  amount  as  the  apparent  teaching,  nor 
so  good  in  quality.  This  is  a  fact  which  the  teacher 
often  overlooks,  and  which  is  also  overlooked,  I  am 
sorry  to  say,  by  some  of  the  authorities  in  our  normal 
schools. 

In  these  days  of  material  progress  and  of  specializa- 
tion in  detail  there  is  more  need  than  ever  of  emphasiz- 
ing general  principles.  Plato  was  not  wholly  mistaken 
in  his  theory  that  the  idea,  the  concept,  the  law,  are 
the  really  fundamental  things,  and  that  the  specific 
details  which  come  before  our  eyes  have  their  chief 
importance  as  manifestations  of  some  underlying  law  or 
concept.  It  is  setting  a  high  ideal  before  a  teacher  to 
insist  that  he  shall  realize  the  meaning  of  this  truth; 
and  even  if  he  has  realized  it  in  his  own  mind,  it  is 
a  difficult  thing  for  him  to  impress  it  upon  the  minds 
of  his  pupils.  This  represents  the  highest  development 
of  the  art  of  education.  Mark  Hopkins  in  the  past 
generation  realized  it  in  almost  unrivalled  fashion; 
William  Graham  Sumner  exemplifies  it  conspicuously 
among  the  teachers  of  the  present  day.  To  be  thus 
clear  and  concrete,  so  that  the  student  shall  understand 
what  you  say,  without  letting  your  concreteness  with- 
draw his  attention  from  the  general  principle,  is  an 
extremely  difficult  combination  to  attain.     But  it  is 

187 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

a  confession  of  weakness  if  our  school  authorities  let 
themselves  be  daunted  by  this  difficulty.  It  is  a  grave 
mistake  if  our  teachers  allow  themselves  to  be  content 
with  second-class  work  because  first-class  work  is  so 
much  harder.  It  is  an  absolutely  fatal  error  if  we 
shut  our  eyes  to  the  existence  of  the  best  because  this 
represents  a  higher  good  than  most  of  us  can  readily 
attain. 

Those  who  hold  these  high  ideals  of  education  must 
be  constantly  on  the  watch  for  new  means  and  methods 
which  shall  add  to  the  range  of  the  pupil's  power  with- 
out degenerating  into  mere  acquisition  or  intellectual 
dissipation.  "More  kinds  of  ability"  must  be  our 
watchword,  if  we  are  to  resist  the  ill-judged  demand 
for  more  kinds  of  knowledge.  One  of  the  most  impor- 
tant among  these  modern  methods  is  to  be  sought  in 
manual  training.  This  is  as  yet  in  its  infancy;  but 
already  the  graduates  of  manual  training  schools  on 
both  sides  of  the  water  show  by  their  proficiency  in 
subsequent  work  the  admirable  results  of  the  system. 
The  Boardman  School  at  New  Haven  is  only  a  few 
years  old;  but  its  graduates,  in  their  careers  in  the 
Sheffield  Scientific  School,  have  already  proved  that 
they  have  been  trained  in  principles,  and  can  master 
principles  better  than  most  of  those  whose  work  has 
been  with  books  alone.  If  we  insist  that  manual  edu- 
cation shall  be  really  a  training,  as  its  name  implies, 
we  can  avoid  the  danger,  always  near  at  hand,  that  it 
shall  be  allowed  to  degenerate  into  a  dissipation.  It 
is  of  the  utmost  importance  to  make,  at  as  early  a 
stage  as  possible  in  the  introduction  of  this  education 
of  the  eye  and  hand,  that  distinction  between  the  de- 
velopment of  power  and  the  imparting  of  knowledge, 
which  is  so  important  in  matters  intellectual.     When 

188 


FUNDAMENTAL  REQUIREMENTS  IN  EDUCATION 

we  have  once  recognized  that  precisely  the  same  antith- 
esis exists  in  matters  of  hand  work  which  has  been  seen 
in  matters  of  brain  work,  we  shall  be  able  to  utilize  the 
new  methods  on  lines  conservative  instead  of  destructive. 

Finally,  I  believe  that  one  of  the  most  important 
applications  of  this  idea  of  power-training  is  found  in 
its  extension  to  the  moral  side  of  education.  We  hear 
a  great  deal  in  these  days  about  preparation  for  citizen- 
ship, and  much  effort  is  made  to  instil  into  the  pupils 
the  knowledge  necessary  for  the  performance  of  their 
civic  duties.  All  this  is  good  as  far  as  it  goes ;  but  we 
must  remember  that  in  this  particular  field  of  education 
every  American  pupil  is  preparing  to  graduate  into  a 
high  school  which  is  coextensive  with  American  poUt- 
ical  and  social  life.  The  whole  activity  of  the  citizen 
is  a  course  of  higher  education  in  morality  —  an  educa- 
tion which  may  be  rightly  directed  or  wrongly  directed, 
used  or  misused,  but  in  which  the  citizen  is  engaged  as 
long  as  he  lives.  If  this  is  true  —  and  there  is  no 
question  of  its  truth  —  any  attempt  to  make  informa- 
tion take  the  place  of  discipline  is  a  menace  to  our 
national  life  for  a  generation  to  come.  As  a  prepara- 
tion for  the  school  of  national  politics,  ten  hours  of 
training  in  civics  are  not  the  equivalent  of  one  minute 
of  training  in  order  and  obedience.  It  will  be  fatal  if, 
in  our  anxiety  to  develop  the  one,  we  should  lose  sight 
of  the  paramount  necessity  of  the  other. 

Let  us  then,  in  our  capacity  as  teachers,  never  forget 
the  importance  of  power  as  compared  with  knowledge. 
Let  us  not  allow  the  public  overestimate  of  details  to 
blind  us  to  the  paramount  necessity  of  training  in  prin- 
ciples. Let  us  arrange  our  courses  and  our  examina- 
tions with  a  view  to  prevent,  rather  than  to  increase, 
the  danger  of  intellectual  dissipation.     In  all  the  de- 

189 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

partments  of  our  life  —  the  intellectual,  manual,  and 
moral  —  let  us  be  true  to  our  primary  duty  of  educating 
not  only  men  and  women  who  know  the  truth,  but  men 
and  women  who  have  strength  to  pursue  it  and  determi- 
nation to  stand  by  it  under  all  conditions. 


190 


THE  USE  AND   CONTROL  OP 
EXAMINATIONS 

Every  practical  educator  knows  that  an  examination 
has  two  aspects,  —  one  looking  toward  the  past,  the 
other  toward  the  future.  It  is  a  means  of  proving  the 
student's  attainment  in  that  which  has  gone  before;  it 
is  also  a  means  of  testing  his  power  for  that  which  is  to 
come.  It  protects  our  schools  against  waste  of  time  in 
the  days  which  precede  it,  by  setting  a  mark  which  the 
pupil  must  reach.  It  protects  our  colleges  against 
waste  of  time  in  the  days  that  follow  it,  by  giving  us 
a  basis  on  which  to  group  our  classes  and  arrange  the 
tasks  which  are  imposed.  It  is  at  once  a  measure  of 
proficiency  in  what  has  been  previously  learned,  and 
of  power  for  what  as  yet  remains  unlearned. 

Unfortunately,  these  two  qualities  do  not  always 
coincide.  We  have  all  had  experience  with  pupils  who 
have  been  faithful  in  the  performance  of  their  duties, 
and  have  acquired  that  kind  of  knowledge  which 
enables  them  to  pass  a  well-conducted  examination 
creditably,  but  who  do  not  possess  that  degree  of 
mental  training  which  fits  them  to  go  on  toward  higher 
studies  side  by  side  with  those  whose  acquirements  may 
be  less,  but  whose  grasp  of  principles  is  stronger.  Pro- 
ficiency in  subjects  studied  during  the  few  months 
previous  to  the  examination  is  largely  a  matter  of 
memory;   and  it  not  infrequently  happens   that  such 

191 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

memory  is  most  highly  developed  in  those  very  pupils 
who  have  done  comparatively  little  real  thinking  for 
themselves.  This  difficulty  may  be  lessened  by  skill  in 
arranging  the  examination;  but,  strive  as  we  may,  it 
can  never  be  wholly  eliminated.  On  the  contrary,  it 
is  a  thing  which  is  increased  by  many  of  our  modern 
changes,  both  in  courses  of  study  and  in  methods  of 
examination. 

In  many  of  the  older  subjects  of  study  the  difficulty 
hardly  exists  at  all.  Take  mathematics,  for  instance. 
In  this  group  of  sciences  proficiency  in  one  grade  is 
almost  synonymous  with  power  to  go  on  with  the  next. 
There  may  be  a  few  children  with  minds  so  peculiarly 
constructed  that  they  are  accurate  "lightning  calcula- 
tors, "  and  of  very  little  use  for  anything  else ;  but  such 
children  are  the  exception  and  not  the  rule.  In  gen- 
eral, the  boy  or  girl  who  has  mastered  the  simple 
operations  of  arithmetic  is  competent  to  go  on  with 
the  more  complex  ones ;  while  the  boy  or  girl  who  fails 
in  these  simple  matters  shows  corresponding  unfitness 
for  what  is  more  advanced.  Similarly,  knowledge  of 
arithmetic  as  a  whole  is  a  test  of  fitness  to  study 
algebra;  knowledge  of  algebra  a  prerequisite  to  ana- 
lytical geometry;  knowledge  of  analytical  geometry  a 
necessity  for  the  student  who  would  go  on  into  the 
differential  calculus.  What  is  true  of  mathematics  is 
also  true  of  grammar,  and  of  those  older  forms  of 
linguistic  study  which  were  based  upon  grammatical 
drill  as  a  foundation.  With  proficiency  in  the  elements 
advanced  class-work  was  made  possible  and  profitable ; 
without  it  the  pupil  wasted  his  own  time  and  that  of 
his  fellows. 

But  with  new  subjects  and  with  new  modes  of  teach- 
ing this  necessary  sequence  is  less  marked.     In  study- 

192 


THE   USE  AND  CONTROL   OF  EXAMINATIONS 

ing  literature,  or  history,  or  descriptive  science,  even 
by  the  methods  which  are  regarded  as  most  modern, 
there  is  no  such  connection  between  attainment  in  what 
is  past  and  power  over  what  is  to  come.  It  is  not 
certain  that  the  pupil  who  remembers  the  answers  to 
the  questions  which  are  asked  in  most  of  our  literature 
examinations  thereby  proves  his  fitness  to  read  with 
profit  the  works  which  are  to  follow.  It  is  not  sure  that 
power  to  remember  the  facts  of  history  which  are  taught 
in  elementary  classes  connotes  a  corresponding  power 
to  use  those  facts  in  advanced  studies.  It  is  even  less 
probable  that  the  results  of  a  course  in  descriptive 
science  pursued  at  an  early  age  show  any  indication  of 
power  to  pursue  this  subject  farther.  I  do  not  wish 
to  be  understood  as  objecting  to  modern  methods  of 
science  study.  For  those  who  are  not  going  to  carry 
these  matters  to  a  point  where  power  in  scientific 
research  is  needed,  they  are  a  very  valuable  means  of 
general  information.  But  for  that  minority  which  does 
need  to  develop  power  in  research  such  premature 
acquirements  are  often  a  hindrance  rather  than  a  help. 
One  of  the  few  men  in  the  country  who  combines  high 
attainments  in  theoretical  and  practical  physics  —  a 
man  eminent  alike  as  an  investigator,  a  teacher,  and 
an  inventor  —  is  authority  for  the  statement  that  you 
cannot  make  a  really  good  physicist  out  of  a  boy  who 
has  been  put  through  a  full  course  of  descriptive  science 
before  he  has  studied  the  mathematical  principles  which 
underlie  it.  I  do  not  know  whether  this  broad  generali- 
zation can  be  proved.  I  am  inclined  to  think  it  an 
over-statement.  But  the  fact  that  such  a  statement 
can  be  made  by  a  responsible  man  shows  that  there  is 
no  necessary  connection,  but  rather  a  conspicuous  ab- 
sence of  connection,  between  acquirements  in  elemen- 
13  193 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

tary  science  as  now  taught,  and  power  to  go  on  with 
that  science  into  classes  which  do  work  of  a  really 
advanced  character. 

Side  by  side  with  this  change  in  subjects,  there  has 
been  a  change  of  methods  of  examination.  Two  genera- 
tions ago  a  large  part  of  our  tests  were  oral.  To-day 
the  increased  size  of  the  classes  has  necessitated  the  use 
of  written  examinations.  That  the  change  has  been  on 
the  whole  a  salutary  as  well  as  a  necessary  one  I  do  not 
question.  In  an  oral  examination  the  personal  element 
is  so  strongly  accentuated  that  it  is  almost  impossible 
to  have  a  guarantee  of  fairness  in  its  administration. 
However  good  may  be  the  intentions  of  the  examiner, 
he  cannot  always  keep  himself  free  from  his  own  pre- 
judgments ;  while  the  absence  of  any  permanent  record 
to  which  appeal  can  be  made  prevents  us  from  applying 
a  corrective  to  the  wrong  impressions  of  the  moment. 
But  the  effect  of  the  change  has  been  to  make  the 
examination  more  exclusively  a  test  of  proficiency  in 
what  is  past  and  to  render  it  less  available  as  a  measure 
of  power  for  what  is  to  come.  In  the  oral  method,  if 
it  was  well  conducted,  the  examiner  found  some  branch 
of  the  subject  with  which  the  pupil  was  familiar,  and 
there  proved  or  disproved  the  thoroughness  of  his 
knowledge.  By  so  doing  the  examiner  could  find  out 
what  the  pupil  really  thought  about  the  subject  rather 
than  what  he  more  or  less  mechanically  remembered. 
But  the  written  examination,  even  in  the  best  hands,  is 
apt  to  be  a  proof  of  the  range  of  a  student's  proficiency 
rather  than  of  its  thoroughness.  In  the  majority  of  the 
subjects  on  which  we  have  to  examine,  it  is  almost 
impossible  to  construct  a  paper  which  will  test  the 
student's  reasoning  power  as  adequately  as  it  tests  his 
memory.     It  too  often  becomes  a  mere   inquiry  as  to 

194 


THE   USE  AND  CONTROL   OF  EXAMINATIONS 

the  extent  of  the  pupil's  knowledge.  Whenever  this 
is  the  case,  it  loses  the  major  part  of  its  value  as 
a  measure  of  fitness  for  anything  which  is  to  come 
afterward. 

The  evils  thus  far  described  are  felt  in  all  examina- 
tions, no  matter  by  whom  they  may  be  conducted.  But 
they  show  themselves  with  peculiar  force  whenever  the 
student  passes  out  of  one  school  or  one  stage  of  his 
educational  work  and  into  another.  In  rising  from 
class  to  class  within  the  limits  of  a  single  institution, 
the  pupil  remains  under  the  charge  of  a  head  master, 
who  can,  to  a  large  degree,  correct  the  evils  inherent  in 
the  examination  system.  He  can  direct  his  subordi- 
nates to  base  their  scheme  of  promotion  on  records  of 
special  work  and  other  matters  outside  of  the  scope  of 
the  examination  itself.  He  can  so  arrange  the  course 
of  study  that  entrance  to  higher  grades  depends  upon 
merit  in  particular  lines  rather  than  on  general  pro- 
ficiency or  faithfulness.  When,  however,  the  student 
passes  from  the  control  of  one  authority  to  another 
independent  one,  it  is  very  hard  to  carry  any  such  policy 
into  effect.  The  difficulty  is  seen  at  its  worst  in  civil 
service  examinations,  where  a  candidate's  entrance  into 
government  employment  is  made  to  depend  upon  tests 
of  past  acquirement  which  can,  at  best,  very  imper- 
fectly indicate  his  fitness  to  serve  the  country  in  the 
line  which  he  has  chosen.  I  would  not  for  one  moment 
undervalue  the  good  which  has  been  done  by  the  adop- 
tion of  the  examination  system  as  a  basis  for  appoint- 
ment in  our  civil  service;  but  I  believe  it  to  be 
generally  admitted,  even  among  the  friends  of  that 
system,  that  its  value  depends  upon  its  effect  in  elimi- 
nating the  grossly  incompetent,  who  rely  on  political 
influence  alone,  rather  than  upon  its  accuracy  in  deter- 

195 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

mining  the  applicant's  probable  usefulness  as  a  public 
servant. 

The  same  difficulty  exists,  though  in  less  degree,  in 
the  transition  from  one  grade  of  educational  institution 
to  another.  It  is  felt  in  the  passage  from  grammar 
school  to  high  school,  from  high  school  to  college,  and 
from  college  to  professional  school.  In  going  from 
grammar  school  to  high  school,  or  from  college  to  pro- 
fessional school,  the  difficulty  is  to  some  extent  lessened 
by  the  fact  that  there  is  often  a  common  board  of  con- 
trol which  makes  co-operation  and  consultation  easy 
between  the  authorities  of  the  two  parts  of  the  educa- 
tional system.  In  the  passage  from  high  school  to  col- 
lege, on  the  other  hand,  the  evil  is  felt  most  seriously 
because  of  the  complete  separation  of  control  and  the 
remoteness  of  location  which  so  often  makes  a  system 
of  personal  consultation  impossible. 

It  is  in  this  application  that  the  problem  of  examina- 
tions gives  rise  to  the  most  acute  controversy.  How 
shall  we  order  our  tests  of  the  student's  proficiency  in 
what  is  behind  him  in  such  a  way  as  to  assure  ourselves 
of  his  power  to  go  on  with  what  is  before  him  ?  How 
can  we  arrange  to  give  to  the  school  the  necessary  free- 
dom in  its  methods  of  instruction,  to  give  the  college 
the  assurance  that  its  pupils  will  be  well  prepared  for 
their  work,  and  to  give  the  students  themselves,  as 
they  pass  from  one  grade  to  the  other,  the  certainty  of 
reasonably  fair  treatment?  This  is  the  question  which 
is  before  us.  With  so  many  conflicting  requirements, 
it  is  no  wonder  that  there  is  divergence  of  opinion  with 
regard  to  the  proper  answer. 

Three  distinct  methods  have  been  devised  for  meet- 
ing this  difficulty :  — 

First.   To  make  the  range  of  examination  questions 

196 


THE   USE  AND  CONTROL   OF  EXAMINATIONS 

wider,  so  that  the  student  shall  have  every  possible 
chance  to  show  what  he  knows. 

Second.  To  supplement  the  written  examination 
paper  by  other  tests,  such  as  certified  note  books, 
objects  produced  by  previous  work,  etc. 

Third.  To  depend  on  certificates  given  by  the  teachers 
who  have  previously  had  the  candidate  in  their  charge ; 
thus  taking  the  work  of  entrance  examination  out  of 
the  hands  of  the  college  authorities  and  relegating  it 
to  the  preparatory  schools. 

The  first  of  these  methods  has  a  certain  amount  of 
merit.     A  skilful  examiner  can  make  a  paper  so  broad 
in  its  scope  that  a  candidate  who  knows  anything  what- 
soever about  his  subject  will  find  some  topic  on  which 
he  is  at  home.     He  thus  reduces  the  element  of  chance 
and  renders  real  help  to  those  candidates  who  under- 
stand one  part  of  the  subject  better  than  another.    But, 
unfortunately,  this   increased  range  of  inquiries   may 
prove  almost  as  helpful  to  the  undeserving  candidate 
as  it  does  to  the  deserving.     The  multiplicity  of  ques- 
tions gives  a  great  opportunity  to  the  coach  who  makes 
a  specialty   of    preparing  candidates   for  a  particular 
series  of  tests  instead  of  educating  them  for  their  life- 
work.     Knowing  how  wide  a  range  of  topics  the  ex- 
aminer  must  cover,  he   can   predict,   with   reasonable 
certainty,  some  specific  things  which  the  paper  is  likely 
to  contain.     The  chances  are  that  his  pupils  will  do 
well   on   these   questions    for   which   they  have    been 
specially  prepared;  and  thus  the  deser^dng  but  unskil- 
fully prepared  candidate,  even  though  he  makes  a  better 
absolute  showing  under  the  system  of  long  papers  than 
he  did  with  short  ones,  finds  his  relative  position  even 
worse  than   it  was   before.     Moreover,  the   inevitable 
hurry  and  confusion  incident  to  the  attempt  to  deal 

197 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

with  a  long  paper  hurts  the  deserving  student  far  more 
than  it  hurts  his  competitor  who  has  been  skilfully 
crammed  for  this  particular  trial.  These  evils  are 
clearly  exemplified  in  the  English  civil  service  exami- 
nations. The  amount  of  time  and  thought  which  is 
spent  on  the  preparation  of  papers  for  these  examina- 
tions is  very  great  indeed.  There  has  been  an  honest 
effort  on  the  part  of  those  in  charge  to  get  the  very 
best  aspirants  for  the  public  service  of  the  British 
Empire.  Yet,  in  spite  of  all  these  things,  it  has  be- 
come proverbial  that  success  depends  upon  skilful 
coaching  far  more  than  upon  intellectual  merit  or  good 
general  training.  What  is  true  of  the  English  civil 
service  examinations  is  true  in  only  less  degree  of  many 
other  European  examination  systems;  and  the  same 
evils  are  making  themselves  felt  in  this  country  wher- 
ever we  approximate  toward  the  English  practice. 

The  plan  of  accepting  certified  note  books  to  supple- 
ment and  correct  the  results  of  examinations  is  essen- 
tially a  compromise.  It  has  at  once  the  merits  and 
defects  which  are  incident  to  a  compromise  system. 
But  the  arguments  which  can  be  urged  in  its  behalf 
can  for  the  most  part  be  urged  even  more  strongly  in 
favor  of  a  frank  adoption  of  a  certificate  system  as  a 
whole.  There  is  something  quite  illogical  in  accepting 
the  pupil's  record  of  his  own  past  work,  and  not  accept- 
ing the  master's  judgment  as  to  the  efficiency  of  that 
work;  for,  unless  the  master  is  a  clear-headed  and 
honest  man,  the  record  is  practically  worthless,  and  if 
the  master  is  thus  clear-headed  and  honest,  he  can 
decide  far  better  than  any  examining  board  the  degree 
to  which  the  pupil  has  profited  by  lectures  and  experi- 
ments. When  once  a  subject  presents  such  character- 
istics that  the  examiners  confess  their  inability  to  judge 

198 


THE  USE  AND  CONTROL  OF  EXAMINATIONS 

of  the  student's  work  by  the  paper  which  he  writes 
under  their  direction,  it  certainly  seems  a  rather  unnec- 
essary waste  of  time  and  strength  for  them  to  insist  on 
having  any  paper  at  all. 

The  third  method  —  admission  to  college  on  certifi- 
cate instead  of  on  examination  —  has  many  advocates. 
I  shall  not  here  attempt  to  discuss  its  merits  and  de- 
merits in  full.  It  is  a  subject  which  would  take  for  its 
full  analysis  more  time  than  we  now  have  at  command. 

It  is  unquestionably  true  that  a  good  preparatory 
school  teacher  can,  in  nine  cases  out  of  ten,  judge  of 
the  fitness  of  his  pupils  to  enter  college  far  better  than 
any  college  examining  board  can  possibly  hope  to  do. 
It  is  also  true  that  the  right  of  admission  by  certificate 
allows  such  a  teacher  a  freedom  in  the  choice  of 
methods  which  is  of  great  advantage  both  to  him  and 
to  his  pupils.  In  spite  of  these  facts,  it  has  disadvan- 
tages which  have  prevented  some  of  our  leading  insti- 
tutions from  adopting  it,  and  which  cause  the  present 
trend  of  movement  to  be  away  from  the  certificate 
system  rather  than  toward  it. 

In  the  first  place,  to  take  the  most  obvious  objection, 
by  no  means  all  of  our  secondary  school  teachers  are 
good  ones.  A  large  number  cannot  be  trusted  to  give 
certificates.  An  equally  large  number  —  and  a  more 
difficult  class  to  deal  with  —  are  not  so  good  that  we 
can  safely  trust  them,  nor  so  bad  that  we  can  safely 
refuse  to  trust  them.  Under  these  circumstances  the 
colleges  have  only  shifted  the  seat  of  their  perplexities. 
Instead  of  selecting  their  students  by  an  examination, 
they  select  the  teachers  whom  they  are  to  trust  by  a 
process  less  automatic  and  more  invidious  than  any 
scheme  of  examinations. 

In  the  second  place  the  abandonment  of  an  exami- 

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THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

nation  system  by  the  colleges  takes  away  an  impor- 
tant stimulus  for  keeping  up  the  standard  of  admission 
requirements.  The  competition  between  masters  of 
different  schools  in  preparing  their  pupils  to  pass 
examinations  has  the  same  sort  of  mixed  effect  that 
competition  has  in  any  other  form  of  business.  It 
causes  methods  to  be  adopted  which  are  not  always  of 
the  very  highest  type ;  but  it  at  the  same  time  brings 
out  an  amount  of  initiative  and  energy  in  teachers  and 
pupils  which  can  be  attained  in  no  other  way.  Even 
the  college  authorities  who  admit  by  certificate  say 
frankly  that  they  would  be  very  reluctant  to  have  that 
practice  become  universal.  They  are  free  to  confess 
that  the  influence  of  those  colleges  which  require  exami- 
nations is  the  thing  which  keeps  our  best  schools  up 
to  that  standard  which  enables  other  colleges  safely  to 
admit  their  students  by  certificate. 

Finally  —  and  this  is  the  decisive  argument  for  the 
retention  of  the  old  plan  —  those  colleges  which  insist 
on  examinations  think  that  they  get  a  better  class  of 
students  by  that  means  than  they  would  by  any  other. 
They  get  those  boys  who  do  not  shrink  from  a  trial  of 
intellectual  strength ;  boys  who  welcome  the  chance  to 
measure  their  power  with  that  of  their  fellows  in  enter- 
ing college,  as  they  will  inevitably  be  called  upon  to 
measure  it  if  they  seek  first-rate  successes  in  later  life. 
We  all  remember  the  fable  of  the  choice  between  the 
doors :  on  the  one  hand,  "  Who  chooses  me  shall  get 
what  he  deserves ; "  on  the  other,  "  Who  chooses  me 
must  hazard  all  he  has."  The  certificate  system  at- 
tracts those  who  would  go  to  the  former  door;  the 
examination  system  calls  to  those  who  are  willing  to 
venture  the  latter.  We  all  know  the  two  types  and 
their  relative  merits. 

200 


THE   USE  AND   CONTROL  OF  EXAMINATIONS 

If  each  of  these  alternatives  thus  proves  unsatisfac- 
tory, is  there  not  some  possible  combination  which  may 
be  suggested? 

I  venture  to  believe  that  such  a  possibility  exists,  and 
that  it  may  be  found  in  a  classification  of  collegiate 
requirements  into  different  groups,  susceptible  of  sepa- 
rate treatment. 

If  we  look  at  the  requirements  for  admission  into  any 
of  our  larger  colleges,  we  shall  find  that  they  naturally 
fall  into  three  classes:  first,  those  subjects  which  are 
required  because  the  student  must  know  them  in  order 
to  have  the  power  to  go  on  with  his  subsequent  studies ; 
second,  those  which  are  required  because  the  college 
authorities  believe  them  to  be  desirable  means  of  attain- 
ing such  power;  and  third,  those  which  are  required 
because  the  men  in  the  secondary  schools  desire  them 
and  ask  for  the  moral  support  of  the  colleges  in  pro- 
moting their  study.  As  a  notable  example  of  the  first 
class  we  may  take  mathematics.  In  our  scientific 
schools,  and  to  a  less  degree  in  all  our  colleges,  some 
knowledge  of  mathematics  is  an  absolute  necessity  for 
the  successful  pursuit  of  studies  included  in  the  course. 
The  pupil  must  know  a  certain  amount  of  algebra  in 
order  to  study  trigonometry;  he  must  know  a  certain 
amount  of  trigonometry  in  order  to  be  able  to  pursue 
successfully  the  arts  of  railroad  surveying  or  of  bridge 
design.  The  same  characteristic  holds  good  of  most  of 
our  language  requirements.  Every  student,  whatever 
he  desires  to  make  of  himself,  needs  to  understand 
something  of  the  use  of  the  English  language,  because 
without  such  use  all  his  communications  of  thought,  if 
not  his  underlying  thoughts  themselves,  are  sure  to 
lack  precision.  Any  benefit  which  is  expected  from 
complex  ideas  by  a  man  or  woman  who  does  not  know 

201 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

how  to  express  them,  is  likely  to  prove  illusory.  And 
every  student  who  is  to  pursue  foreign  literature  in  his 
college  course  must  first  have  a  knowledge  of  the  ele- 
ments of  the  language  in  which  it  is  written,  because 
without  such  knowledge  he  will  waste  his  own  time 
and  that  of  his  fellows. 

Side  by  side  with  these  requirements  which  are  indis- 
pensable come  others  of  a  more  auxiliary  character. 
Not  content  with  requiring  a  knowledge  of  English 
expression,  the  colleges  prescribe  the  reading  of  certain 
books  in  English  literature.  Not  stopping  with  the 
test  of  power  to  read  and  parse  individual  passages  in 
Latin,  the  colleges  prescribe  a  certain  quantity  of  Latin 
reading  as  essential  to  the  purpose  in  hand.  They  also 
require  with  each  year  an  increasiqg  knowledge  of 
modern  languages,  not  because  the  student  is  neces- 
sarily going  to  use  both  French  and  German  in  his 
college  studies,  but  because  no  man  is  regarded  by 
them  as  fitted  for  higher  education  imless  he  has  a 
certain  reading  knowledge  of  both  these  languages. 

There  is  also  a  third  group  of  studies  required  not  as 
a  necessary  basis  for  subsequent  work  but  as  a  part  of 
the  general  scheme  of  secondary  education  in  the  coun- 
try, to  which  it  is  desirable  to  give  fair  recognition. 
So  many  men  in  our  schools  desire  to  teach  history, 
and  can  teach  it  well,  that  they  wish  this  subject  to 
be  recognized  in  the  college  requirements;  lest,  by  a 
failure  to  recognize  it,  its  position  in  the  schools  should 
be  degraded.  What  is  true  of  history  is  true  of  a 
great  deal  of  that  descriptive  science  which  has  so  large 
a  part  in  our  school  courses  at  the  present  day.  It  is 
put  in  the  scheme  of  requirements  for  admission  to  col- 
lege, not  so  much  because  of  a  direct  need  of  the  college 
student,  nor  even  because  of  its  indirect  bearing  on 

202 


THE   USE  AND  CONTROL   OF  EXAMINATIONS 

meeting  such  a  need,  as  because  of  a  desire  on  the 
part  of  the  colleges  to  co-operate  with  the  secondary- 
school  teachers  by  giving  due  emphasis  to  all  those 
things  which  they  desire  to  include  in  their  course. 

It  is  obvious,  however,  that  the  attempt  to  put  all 
these  different  classes  of  subjects  on  the  same  basis 
is  quite  illogical.  The  student  who  by  a  fair  and 
sound  test  is  found  radically  deficient  in  studies  of  the 
first  class  has  no  business  to  go  on  further.  No  pupil 
who  is  ignorant  of  arithmetic  can  study  algebra  without 
injuring  himself  and  his  fellow  students.  No  pupil 
who  is  ignorant  of  elementary  algebra  and  geometry 
should  be  allowed  to  go  on  with  the  scientific  school 
course,  no  matter  what  may  be  his  attainments  in  other 
lines.  In  like  manner,  a  knowledge  of  the  essentials  of 
English  expression  and  of  certain  fundamental  points 
in  those  other  languages  which  the  student  is  likely  to 
use  in  his  college  course  is  a  matter  of  vital  necessity. 
No  amount  of  acquirements  and  attainments  in  litera- 
ture can  logically  be  allowed  to  make  up  for  a  deficiency 
at  this  central  point.  It  is  on  these  subjects  that  the 
case  for  college  examinations  is  strongest.  This  is  the 
point  at  which  any  deficiency  of  preparation  on  the  part 
of  the  candidates  will  hurt  them  most.  It  is  also  the 
point  where  an  examination  system  is  most  feasible; 
where  cram  counts  for  least  and  power  for  most;  where 
the  school  teacher  with  high  ideals  of  education  has 
least  reason  to  complain  of  the  requirement  that  his 
pupils  should  be  examined  by  an  independent  authority, 
because  no  method  of  education  which  falls  short  of 
meeting  this  test  can  possibly  be  considered  good. 

On  the  second  group  of  studies  —  those  which  are 
auxiliary  to  the  attainment  of  this  power  —  greater  lati- 
tude can  be  allowed.     I  should  be  in  favor  at  once  of 

203 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

putting  all  examinations  on  the  extent  of  knowledge  in 
these  auxiliary  subjects  into  the  hands  of  a  common 
examining  board,  in  which  different  groups  of  educa- 
tors were  represented.  Whether  it  would  be  wise  to 
go  one  step  farther  and  introduce  the  certificate  system 
in  subjects  of  this  group,  is  a  matter  which  I  should 
hardly  like  to  prejudge  at  present. 

In  the  third  group  of  studies  the  certificate  system 
could  be  allowed  from  the  very  outset.  It  is  just  here 
that  the  arguments  for  that  system  are  strongest,  for  in 
this  group  the  possible  variety  of  methods  is  greatest, 
the  difficulties  of  examination  most  unavoidable,  and 
the  reasons  strongest  for  preferring  the  teacher's  judg- 
ment to  that  of  an  independent  examiner  or  examining 
board. 

If  a  phrase  is  needed  to  describe  the  principle  on 
which  this  whole  system  of  division  rests,  I  should  for- 
mulate it  as  follows:  Divide  our  requirements  into 
three  groups  of  subjects:  first,  prerequisites  for  power 
to  go  on  with  collegiate  study ;  second,  attainments  aux- 
iliary to  such  power ;  third,  attainments  chiefly  useful  in 
the  general  scheme  of  education.  Let  the  tests  of  power 
as  to  what  is  to  follow  be  in  the  hands  of  those  who  are 
to  have  charge  of  the  student  in  the  years  which  are  to 
follow.  Let  the  tests  of  attainment  on  what  is  behind 
be  in  the  hands  of  those  who  have  had  charge  of  the 
pupil  in  the  years  which  are  behind. 

This  combination  would  have  the  advantage  of  reduc- 
ing the  number  of  our  college  examinations  —  in  itself 
an  extremely  desirable  thing  —  of  preserving  a  standard 
of  quality  which  schools  would  compete  with  one 
another  to  reach,  and  of  allowing  at  the  same  time 
the  utmost  possible  latitude  in  the  methods  employed 
by  different  teachers  to  bring  their  pupils  up  to  that 

204 


THE  USE  AND  CONTROL   OF  EXAMINATIONS 

standard.  On  the  other  hand  it  would  be  attended 
with  certain  dangers  and  difficulties.  The  chief  objec- 
tions which  are  likely  to  be  thus  raised  may  be  stated  as 
follows :  — 

First.  The  attempt,  which  has  been  more  than  once 
made,  to  lay  special  stress  on  tests  of  power  rather  than 
on  knowledge  —  for  instance,  sight  reading  of  Latin 
and  Greek  authors,  translation  of  English  into  Latin, 
etc.  —  has  disappointed  the  expectation  of  its  advocates. 

Second.  In  the  inevitable  uncertainty  attending  the 
results  of  entrance  examinations  —  due  partly  to  luck, 
partly  to  the  personal  equation  of  the  examiner,  and 
partly  to  the  varying  physical  condition  of  the  candi- 
dates —  the  substitution  of  a  small  number  of  decisive 
examinations  for  the  very  great  number  now  existing 
will  cause  some  candidates  to  be  unjustly  rejected  who, 
under  the  present  requirements,  atone  for  their  defi- 
ciencies in  some  lines  by  indication  of  ability  in  others. 

Third.  The  necessary  withdrawal  from  the  examina- 
tion scheme  of  large  parts  of  the  work  in  history, 
descriptive  science,  or  English  literature  will  serve  to 
give  these  subjects  an  apparently  inferior  position,  and 
will  result  in  their  neglect  in  those  schools  which  desire 
to  prove  their  success  on  the  basis  of  the  showing  made 
by  their  candidates  in  college  examinations. 

Let  us  take  up  these  points  in  order. 

The  first  of  these  objections  is,  I  believe,  historically 
well  founded.  It  is,  however,  based  on  the  experience 
of  a  time  when  neither  teachers  nor  examiners  knew 
their  business  as  well  as  they  now  do.  Latin  prose 
composition,  as  taught  in  the  schools  of  a  generation 
ago,  was  simply  a  piece  of  mechanical  drill  on  certain 
fixed  phrases,  without  any  infusion  of  the  spirit  of  the 
language.     The  examiners,  themselves  trained  for  the 

205 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

most  part  in  these  same  defective  methods,  set  papers 
which  were  not  real  tests  of  power,  and  encouraged 
cramming  of  a  bad  sort.  The  same  thing  may  be  said 
of  most  of  the  examinations  in  sight  reading  of  classical 
authors  They  furnished  no  measure  of  that  kind  of 
power  which  is  required  by  the  college  student  in  his 
subsequent  use  of  the  Latin  or  Greek  language.  Many 
of  these  papers  depend  far  more  upon  the  quick  com- 
mand of  a  vocabulary,  at  times  when  the  candidate  is 
specially  nervous,  than  upon  knowledge  of  linguistic 
structure.  In  the  easy  Latin  or  Greek  which  is  gen- 
erally given  out  on  these  papers,  the  candidate  who  can 
remember  the  vocabulary  can  guess  at  the  structure  far 
better  than  the  candidate  who  knows  the  structure  can 
extemporize  the  vocabulary.  Nor  can  this  difficulty  in 
the  sight  paper  be  wholly  avoided  by  notes  which  give 
the  meaning  of  a  few  words,  for  those  words  which 
help  one  boy  may  prove  useless  to  another.  The  partial 
failure  of  sight  papers  to  accomplish  their  end  proves 
chiefly  the  defectiveness  of  the  means,  and  little  or 
nothing  as  to  the  attainability  of  the  object. 

Of  course  it  may  be  freely  admitted  that  it  would 
require  great  ability  to  carry  out  the  proposed  plan  by 
right  methods  instead  of  wrong  ones.  It  would  per- 
haps be  a  number  of  years  before  we  should  know  what 
furnished,  on  the  whole,  the  best  means  of  testing  the 
student's  power.  But  I  feel  quite  confident  that  noth- 
ing which  has  hitherto  been  done  indicates  that  the 
question  could  not  be  fairly  well  solved  in  a  reason- 
able time. 

The  argument  concerning  the  dangerous  fewness  of 
the  papers  under  the  proposed  plan  deserves  careful 
consideration.  Any  one  who  knows  the  uncertainty 
attending  the  results  of  examinations  in  general,  and 

206 


THE   USE  AND   CONTROL  OF  EXAMINATIONS 

of  written  examinations  in  particular,  will  be  reluctant 
to  reduce  the  variety  of  chances  given  to  the  student  to 
prove  in  different  kinds  of  papers  his  probable  fitness 
for  any  course  which  he  desires  to  undertake.  Yet  I 
believe  that  the  dangers  which  arise  in  this  way  would 
be  more  than  offset  by  the  safety  due  to  an  increased 
care  of  reading  which  the  substitution  of  the  few  papers 
for  the  many  would  render  possible.  If  we  should 
further  extend  to  teachers  of  proved  ability  the  oppor- 
tunity to  recommend,  at  the  risk  of  their  own  reputa- 
tion, for  provisional  admission  to  our  freshman  classes, 
pupils  to  whom  the  new  system  seemed  to  have  done 
injustice,  we  should  have  in  our  hands  a  check  which 
would  not  be  greatly  liable  to  abuse,  and  which  would 
help  to  protect  deserving  students  from  the  conse- 
quences of  ill  luck. 

The  objection  regarding  discrimination  between 
studies  is  perhaps  the  one  which  will  be  most  strongly 
urged.  Yet  I  believe  this  objection  to  be  based  on 
what  is  in  the  long  run  not  a  fault  but  a  merit. 

It  is  natural  enough  that  a  master  in  a  secondary 
school  who  has  special  ability  in  teaching  descriptive 
science,  whether  in  the  form  of  physics,  biology,  or 
history,  should  wish  for  the  opportunity  to  prove  what 
his  pupils  can  do  in  collegiate  examinations.  He  will 
urge  that  if  they  are  not  given  this  opportunity  to  be 
examined,  they  will  neglect  the  subjects  in  such  a  way 
as  to  do  injustice  to  him  and  harm  to  themselves.  It 
may  seem  hard  to  tell  him  that  the  apparent  force  of 
these  arguments  of  his  is  based  upon  an  over-valuation 
of  the  usefulness  of  his  work  to  boys  and  girls  who  are 
going  to  college.  Yet  I  believe  this  to  be  the  truth; 
and  if  it  is  truth  it  should  be  told  plainly. 

I  am  not  underrating  the  importance  of  these  things 

207 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

in  the  scheme  of  secondary  education.  The  pupils  who 
are  going  directly  from  the  high  school  into  practical 
life  need  a  somewhat  extensive  and  therefore  somewhat 
superficial  study  of  natural  science  and  human  history. 
Most  of  these  pupils  must  get  their  knowledge  of  these 
subjects  then  if  they  are  to  get  it  at  all.  But  for  those 
who  are  going  to  pursue  these  studies  afterward,  such 
preliminary  acquaintance  with  history  and  with  science 
does  not  take,  with  any  complete  equivalence,  the  place 
of  language  or  of  mathematics.  History  and  natural 
science  are  studies  which  mark  the  culmination  of  an 
educational  course,  and  which,  if  over-developed  far 
before  the  close,  have  a  tendency  to  weaken  rather  than 
to  strengthen  the  student's  powers  of  application.  If 
by  giving  undue  importance  to  these  things  in  the 
examination  system,  we  add  an  artificial  stimulus  to 
their  pursuit  by  boys  or  girls  who  are  afterward  going 
to  college,  I  believe  that  we  delay  the  advent  of  a 
reform  in  our  school  system  which  is  of  vital  impor- 
tance to  us  all.  That  reform  will  consist  in  the  separa- 
tion of  our  classes,  both  in  the  grammar  schools  and  in 
the  high  schools,  into  groups  that  are  about  to  finish 
their  school  days  and  groups  that  are  preparing  to 
advance  further. 

In  almost  all  our  previous  groupings  we  have  tried  to 
classify  pupils  on  the  lines  of  their  different  tastes,  real 
or  supposed.  There  is  a  great  deal  to  be  said  in  favor 
of  a  different  system,  which  should  classify  them  on 
the  basis  of  the  probable  duration  of  the  studies.  It  is  a 
false  idea  to  assume  that  those  things  which  are  taught 
to  the  students  whose  courses  near  their  end  are  thereby 
cheapened  or  made  inferior  in  value;  and  it  is  a  yet 
worse  mistake  if,  in  the  effort  to  avoid  such  cheapen- 
ing, we  put  them  into  a  place  where  they  did  not  really 

208 


THE   USE  AND  CONTROL   OF  EXAMINATIONS 

belong.  Our  system  of  secondary  education  has  reached 
a  point  of  achievement  where  it  can  stand  on  its  own 
merits.  Those  in  charge  of  it  recognize  that  they  have 
outgrown  the  stage  where  their  best  usefulness  was 
found  in  being  mere  preparatory  schools.  Let  us  eman- 
cipate ourselves  from  a  set  of  ideas  which  are  but  the 
remnant  of  a  state  of  things  which  we  have  now  out- 
grown. Thus,  and  thus  only,  shall  we  obtain  the  best 
preparation  for  college,  and  the  fullest  development  of 
the  value  and  freedom  of  our  secondary  education. 


14  209 


YALE  PROBLEMS,  PAST  AND  PRESENT 

Thikteen  years  ago  my  honored  predecessor  traced 
in  his  inaugural  address  the  changes  which  two  centu- 
ries had  developed  in  Yale's  educational  methods  and 
ideals,  and  showed  with  clearness  what  were  the  corre- 
sponding changes  in  organization  which  would  best  fit 
her  to  apply  these  methods  and  approach  these  ideals. 
What  has  once  been  done  so  well  we  need  not  undertake 
to  do  again.  Let  us  rather  proceed  to  a  detailed  con- 
sideration of  the  problems  which  now  confront  us  in  the 
various  departments  of  college  and  university  life.  Let 
us  formulate  the  questions  which  press  for  solution. 
Let  us  study  the  good  and  evil  attendant  on  various 
methods  of  dealing  therewith.  Let  us  see,  as  far  as  we 
may,  what  lines  of  policy  in  these  matters  of  immediate 
practical  moment  will  enable  us  best  to  meet  the  de- 
mands of  the  oncoming  century. 

These  problems  are  for  the  most  part  not  peculiar  to 
Yale.  The  questions  which  present  themselves  to  the 
authorities  here  are  in  large  measure  the  same  which 
arise  elsewhere.  But  the  conditions  governing  their 
solution  are  different.  We  may  best  understand  the 
work  which  Yale  has  to  do  if  we  study  the  problems  in 
their  general  form,  as  they  come  before  the  whole  brother- 
hood of  educators  as  a  body;  and  then  try  to  solve  them 
in  the  particular  form  which  is  fixed  by  the  special  cir- 

210 


YALE  PROBLEMS,  PAST  AND  PRESENT 

cumstances,  past  and  present,  which  have  made  Yale 
University  what  it  is. 

Fifty  years  ago  the  duties  of  college  administration 
were  relatively  simple.  There  was  at  that  time  a  cer- 
tain curriculum  of  studies,  chiefly  in  classics  and  in  de- 
ductive science,  which  the  public  accepted  as  necessary 
for  the  development  of  an  educated  man.  These  studies 
were  taught  by  traditional  methods  which  compelled  the 
pupil  to  perform  a  considerable  amount  of  work  whether 
he  liked  it  or  not.  The  student  body  was  a  homoge- 
neous one,  meeting  in  the  same  recitation  rooms  day  by 
day.  The  classes  readily  acquired  a  spirit  of  good  fel- 
lowship and  democracy.  Outside  conditions  favored 
the  maintenance  of  this  spirit.  Differences  in  wealth 
throughout  the  community  were  less  conspicuous  than 
they  are  to-day.  College  education  was  so  cheap  that  it 
fell  within  the  reach  of  all.  Most  of  the  students  were 
restricted  in  their  means.  The  few  who  possessed 
much  money  found  comparatively  little  opportunity 
for  spending  it  in  legitimate  ways.  Rich  and  poor 
stood  on  a  common  footing  as  regarded  participation 
in  the  social  ambitions  and  privileges  of  college  life. 
The  intellectual  education  which  such  a  college  gave  to 
the  majority  of  its  students  was  but  an  incidental 
service  as  compared  with  their  education  in  sterling 
virtue.  The  institution  which  could  furnish  this  double 
training  met  fully  the  requirements  which  public 
opinion  imposed. 

The  first  of  the  disturbing  elements  which  entered  to 
complicate  the  problem  of  college  education  was  found 
in  the  development  of  professional  schools.  Down  to 
the  early  part  of  the  present  century,  professional  study 
was  largely  done  in  private,  in  the  office  of  some  suc- 
cessful lawyer  or  doctor  or  in  the  study  of  some  experi- 

211 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

enced  minister.  Even  when  schools  of  theology,  of  law, 
or  of  medicine  were  established,  they  at  first  occupied 
themselves  largely  with  teaching  the  same  kind  of  things 
that  might  have  been  learned  in  the  office  by  the  old 
method.  But  about  the  middle  of  the  present  century  a 
new  and  more  enlightened  view  of  technical  training 
arose.  It  was  seen  that  a  professional  school  did  its 
best  work  when  it  taught  principles  rather  than  practice. 
Instead  of  cramming  the  students  with  details  which 
they  would  otherwise  learn  afterward,  it  was  found 
much  better  to  train  them  in  methods  of  reasoning 
which  otherwise  they  would  not  learn  at  all.  This  study 
of  principles,  to  be  thoroughly  effective,  necessarily  oc- 
cupied several  years.  There  was  a  strong  pressure  to 
introduce  the  elements  of  these  professional  studies  into 
the  curriculum ;  and  a  demand  that  when  once  they  were 
incorporated  in  the  college  course  they  should  be  taught, 
not  in  a  perfunctory  way,  but  with  the  same  standard  of 
excellence  which  was  achieved  in  our  best  professional 
schools. 

Meantime,  apart  from  these  changes  in  the  method  of 
technical  training,  the  sphere  of  interest  of  the  culti- 
vated men  of  the  country  was  constantly  widening. 
The  course  of  college  study  which  satisfied  an  earlier 
generation  was  inadequate  for  a  later  one.  The  man 
who  would  have  breadth  of  sympathy  with  the  various 
departments  of  human  knowledge  could  not  content 
himself  with  classics,  mathematics,  and  psychology.  He 
must  be  familiar  with  modern  literature  as  well  as 
ancient,  with  empirical  science  as  well  as  deductive. 

If  we  had  at  once  widened  the  college  curriculum 
enough  to  correspond  to  the  increased  range  of  human 
interest,  and  lengthened  the  period  of  professional  study 
enough  to  give  each  man  the  fullest  recognized  train- 

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YALE  PROBLEMS,  PAST  AND  PRESENT 

ing  for  his  specialty,  —  if,  to  quote  the  old  educational 
phrase,  we  had  taught  each  man  something  of  every- 
thing and  everything  of  something,  —  the  time  of  univer- 
sity education  would  h'ave  lengthened  itself  to  ten  or 
fifteen  years.  Its  complete  fruition  would  have  been  a 
luxury  out  of  reach  of  all  but  the  favored  few.  The 
difficulty  could  be  met  only  by  the  adoption  of  an 
elective  system, — a  system  which  ceased  to  treat  the 
college  course  as  a  fixed  curriculum  for  all,  and  gave 
an  opportunity  for  the  selection  of  groups  of  studies 
adapted  to  the  varying  needs  of  the  several  students. 

The  introduction  of  these  methods  of  university 
education,  necessary  as  it  was,  has  been  nevertheless 
attended  with  serious  dangers  and  evils. 

In  the  first  place  there  is  apt  to  be  a  change  in  the 
mode  of  instruction  which,  while  good  for  the  best 
students,  runs  the  risk  of  proving  bad  for  the  ordinary 
ones.  The  old  method  of  handling  large  classes  in  a 
fixed  course  of  study  under  the  recitation  system  re- 
quired all  the  students  to  do  a  modicum  of  work,  and 
enabled  the  teacher  to  see  whether  they  were  doing  it 
or  not.  The  divisions  were  adjusted  and  could  be  con- 
stantly readjusted  with  that  end  in  view.  The  time  of 
the  instructors  was  so  far  economized  by  the  narrow 
range  of  subjects  taught  that  their  attention  could  be 
properly  concentrated  on  this  one  point  of  keeping  the 
students  up  to  their  work  by  a  daily  oral  examination. 
But  with  the  increasing  number  of  things  to  be  learned, 
the  variation  in  the  size  of  classes,  and  the  demands 
which  the  best  students  now  make  for  really  advanced 
teaching,  this  supervision  and  concentration  is  no 
longer  possible.  The  instructor  who  is  teaching  small 
groups  of  selected  men  who  have  a  particular  interest 
in  his  subject,  is  forced  to  content  himself  with  what  is 

213 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

little  more  than  a  lecture  in  teaching  the  larger  groups 
of  ordinary  men  to  whom  the  subject  has  only  a  general 
interest.  A  lecture  system  of  this  kind  is  beset  with 
perils.  It  is  something  of  which  we  have  to  make  use, 
because  there  are  not  enough  first-rate  men  in  the 
country  to  teach  all  the  subjects  of  study  which  this 
generation  demands,  in  classes  of  size  small  enough  to 
adapt  themselves  to  the  recitation  system.  The  choice 
in  many  lines  of  study  lies  between  having  recitations 
with  fourth-rate  men  or  lectures  from  first-rate  ones. 
I  never  met  a  good  teacher  who  really  approved  of  the 
lecture  system,  or  who  did  not  prefer  small  classes  to 
large  ones.  But  these  really  good  teachers  are  just 
the  men  that  we  wish  to  bring  in  contact  with  as  many 
students  as  possible.  If  we  refuse  to  let  them  lecture, 
we  either  confine  the  benefit  of  their  instructions  to  a 
few,  or  increase  their  hours  beyond  the  possibility  of 
human  endurance. 

Another  evil  connected  with  the  elective  system  is 
the  loss  of  esprit  de  corps.  In  a  college  like  West  Point 
or  Annapolis,  where  a  homogeneous  body  of  men  is 
pursuing  a  common  scheme  of  studies,  with  a  common 
end  in  view,  and  with  rigorous  requirements  as  to  the 
work  which  must  be  done  by  each  individual,  this 
spirit  is  seen  at  its  strongest.  The  place  sets  its 
character  stamp  upon  every  one,  —  sometimes  perhaps 
for  evil,  but  in  the  vast  majority  of  cases  for  good.  An 
approximation  to  this  state  of  things  was  seen  in  our 
American  colleges  during  the  earlier  years  of  their 
history.  In  many  of  them  it  is  still  maintained  to  a 
considerable  degree.  But  the  forces  which  maintain  it 
are  far  less  potent  to-day  than  they  were  fifty  years  ago. 
The  community  of  interests  is  less,  the  community  of 
hard  work  is   very  much  less.     If  this  college   spirit 

2U 


YALE  PROBLEMS,  PAST  AND  PRESENT 

once  passes  away,  the  whole  group  of  qualities  which 
we  have  known  by  the  name  of  college  democracy  is  in 
danger  of  passing  also.  For  the  increase  of  wealth  in 
the  outside  world  is  a  perpetual  menace  to  old-fashioned 
democratic  equality.  If  we  have  within  the  college 
life  not  only  differences  in  things  studied,  but  differ- 
ences in  enjoyment  between  rich  and  poor,  we  are  at 
once  in  danger  of  witnessing  a  development  of  social 
distinctions  and  class  interests  which  shall  sweep  away 
the  thing  which  was  most  characteristic  and  most 
valuable  in  the  earlier  education  of  our  colleges.  Not 
the  intellectual  life  only,  nor  the  social  life  only,  but 
the  whole  religious  and  moral  atmosphere  suffers  de- 
terioration if  a  place  becomes  known  either  as  a  rich 
man's  college,  or,  worse  yet,  as  a  college  where  rich 
and  poor  meet  on  different  footings.  What  shall  it 
profit  us,  if  we  gain  the  whole  world  and  lose  our  own 
soul ;  if  we  develop  the  intellectual  and  material  side  of 
our  education,  and  lose  the  traditional  spirit  of  democ- 
racy and  loyalty  and  Christianity  ? 

That  there  will  be  an  advance  in  thoroughness  of 
preparation  for  the  special  lines  of  work  which  our 
students  are  to  undertake  is  a  thing  of  which  we  may 
safely  rest  assured.  That  there  shall  be  a  similar 
advance  in  the  general  training  for  citizenship  in  the 
United  States  is  an  obligation  for  whose  fulfilment  our 
universities  are  responsible.  The  Yale  of  the  future 
must  count  for  even  more  than  the  Yale  of  the  past  in 
the  work  of  city.  State,  and  nation.  It  must  come  into 
closer  touch  with  our  political  life,  and  be  a  larger  part 
of  that  life.  To  this  end  it  is  not  enough  for  her  to 
train  experts  competent  to  deal  with  the  financial  and 
legal  problems  which  are  before  us.  Side  by  side  with 
this  training,  she  must  evoke  in  the  whole  body  of  her 

215 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

students  and  alumni  that  wider  sense  of  their  obligation 
as  members  of  a  free  commonwealth  which  the  America 
of  the  twentieth  century  requires. 

The  central  problem,  which  we  all  have  to  face,  and 
about  which  all  other  problems  group  themselves,  is 
this ;  How  shall  we  make  our  educational  system  meet 
the  world's  demands  for  progress  on  the  intellectual 
side,  without  endangering  the  growth  of  that  which 
has  proved  most  valuable  on  the  moral  side  ?  And  it 
is  the  latter  part  which  demands  the  most  immediate 
attention  from  a  college  president,  not  necessarily  be- 
cause it  is  more  important  in  itself  —  for  where  two 
things  are  both  absolutely  indispensable,  a  comparison 
of  relative  values  is  meaningless  —  but  because  the 
individual  professors  can,  and  under  the  keen  competi- 
tion between  universities  must,  attend  in  large  measure 
to  the  excellence  of  instruction  in  their  several  depart- 
ments, while  the  action  of  the  university  as  a  whole, 
and  the  intelligent  thought  of  the  university  adminis- 
tration is  requisite  to  prevent  the  sacrifice  of  the  moral 
interest  of  the  whole  commonwealth. 

There  are  four  ways  in  which  we  may  strive  to  deal 
with  this  diflQculty :  — 

First.  By  relegating  the  work  of  character  develop- 
ment more  and  more  to  the  preparatory  schools.  Our 
acceptance  or  non-acceptance  of  this  solution  deter- 
mines our  attitude  toward  the  problem  of  entrance 
requirements. 

Second.  By  striving  to  limit  the  occasion  for  the  use 
of  money  on  the  part  of  the  student.  The  necessity 
for  such  limitation  constitutes  the  problem  of  college 
expenses. 

Third.  By  endeavoring  to  create  a  body  of  common 
interests  and  traditions  outside  of  the  college  course 

216 


YALE  PROBLEMS,  PAST  AND  PRESENT 

which  shall  make  up  for  the  diversity  of  interests  within 
it.  The  most  widely  discussed,  though  possibly  not 
the  most  important,  point  under  this  head  is  furnished 
by  the  problem  of  college  athletics. 

Fourth.  By  so  arranging  the  work  of  the  different 
departments  of  study  that  the  variety  inherent  in  the 
elective  system  shall  not  be  attended  with  intellectual 
dissipation ;  providing  the  chance  for  economy  of  effort 
on  the  part  of  the  instructor  and  the  assurance  of  syste- 
matic co-operation  on  the  part  of  the  pupils.  This  is 
the  problem  of  university  organization. 

The  plan  of  relegating  the  responsibility  for  character 
development  to  the  preparatory  schools  has  at  first  sight 
much  to  commend  it.  It  relieves  the  college  officers  of 
the  most  disagreeable  part  of  their  duty,  that  which 
pertains  to  matters  of  discipline,  and  enables  them  to 
concentrate  their  attention  on  their  function  as  teachers. 
It  meets  the  demands  of  many  progressive  men  engaged 
in  secondary  education,  some  of  whom  long  for  an  ex- 
tension of  their  professional  functions  into  new  fields 
of  activity,  while  others,  justly  proud  of  their  success 
in  the  formation  of  character  under  existing  conditions, 
desire  the  additional  opportunity  which  is  given  them 
if  they  can  keep  their  oldest  boys  a  year  or  two  longer 
under  their  influence.  The  larger  the  university  the 
greater  becomes  the  pressure  in  this  direction. 

But  with  conditions  as  they  exist  at  Yale,  I  cannot 
think  it  wise  to  yield  to  this  pressure.  If  we  take  a 
year  from  the  beginning  of  the  college  course,  that  year 
will  be  spent  by  most  of  the  boys  either  in  a  high  school 
or  a  large  academy.  In  the  former  case  we  approach 
the  German  or  French  system  of  education;  in  the 
latter  the  English.  A  compromise  between  the  two, 
whereby  a  boy  finishes  his  high  school  course  and  then 

217 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

takes   the   additional  year  at  an   academy,    is   hardly 
admissible  on  any  ground ;  the  single  year  is  somewhat 
too  short  to  give  the  intellectual  influences  of  the  new- 
place  to  which  the  boy  goes,  and  far  too  short  to  give 
its  character  influences.     I  cannot  believe  that  any  one 
who  has  watched  the  workings  of  the  French  or  German 
system  would  desire  to  see  it  adopted  in  this  country. 
The  passage  at  an  advanced  age  from  the  discipline  of 
the  lyc^e  or  gymnasium  to  the  freedom  of   the  uni- 
versity, however  well  it  may  work  in  its  intellectual 
results,  does  not  produce  the  kind  of  moral  ones  which 
we  need.     The  English  system  has  wider  possibilities; 
and   for   England   it  does   extremely  well.     But  it  is 
essentially  a  product  of  English  conditions,  —  that  is, 
of  aristocratic  ones.     It  is  an  education  for  a  privileged 
class.     In  America,  on  the  other  hand,  we  wish  our 
higher   education   to  remain   democratic.     We  should 
not  be  satisfied  with  a  system  which  excluded  from  its 
benefits  the  large  number  of  boys  who  come  from  insti- 
tutions, public  or  private,  which  are  situated  near  their 
own  homes,  and  prepare  only  small  groups  for  college. 
And  even  to  those  who  are  fortunate  enough  to  come 
from  the  best  preparatory  schools,  the  loss  in  college 
life  would  often  outweigh  the  gain  in  school  life.     A 
system   of    influences   whose   operation    terminates    at 
nineteen  or  twenty  fixes  a  boy's  moral  and  social  place 
too  soon.     For  the  young  man  who  has  grown  to  the 
full  measure  of  his  moral  stature  at  this  age  it  is  good ; 
for  the  one  who  matures  later  it  is  distinctly  bad.     In 
our  every-day  experience  at  Yale,  as  we  watch  the  inter- 
action between  school  estimates  and  college  estimates 
of  character,  we  can   see   that  whatever  postpones  a 
man's  final  social  rating  to  as  late  a  day  as  possible 
lengthens  the  period  of  strenuous  moral  effort,  increases 

218 


YALE  PROBLEMS,  PAST  AND  PRESENT 

the  chance  of  continued  growth,  and  is  of  the  largest 
value  to  the  boys  and  men  of  the  best  type. 

The  abandonment  of  the  responsibility  for  forming 
character  would  have  its  disadvantages  for  the  univer- 
sity no  less  than  for  the  students.  A  boy's  loyalty  will 
remain  where  his  moral  character  has  formed  itself. 
The  devotion  and  sentiment  of  the  Englishman  play 
not  so  much  about  Oxford  or  Cambridge  as  about  Eton, 
Harrow,  and  Rugby.  Universities  which  derive  their 
prestige  and  their  wealth  from  the  past  rather  than 
from  the  present  may  perhaps  endure  this  deprivation. 
Not  so  the  American  college  or  university,  which  looks 
for  its  strongest  support  to  the  loyalty  of  its  alumni. 

"With  the  desire  of  secondary  school  teachers  to  ex- 
tend their  work  I  have  the  strongest  sympathy.  To  the 
idea  of  co-operation  between  universities  and  schools, 
whereby  each  shall  arrange  its  teaching  with  reference 
to  the  other's  needs,  I  am  fully  and  absolutely  com- 
mitted, and  purpose  to  do  all  that  I  can  to  further  it. 
A  university  fulfils  its  true  function  only  when  it  thus 
seeks  and  gives  aid  outside  of  itself.  But  I  believe 
that  the  chance  for  this  extension,  this  co-operation, 
and  this  leadership  is  to  come  through  the  freer  inter- 
change of  thought  and  interchange  of  men  between 
school  teaching  and  university  teaching,  rather  than 
through  a  transference  of  subjects  from  one  to  the 
other.  I  believe  that  with  the  conditions  as  they  exist, 
the  true  policy  for  our  university  with  regard  to 
entrance  requirements  is  to  find  out  what  our  secondary 
schools  can  do  for  their  pupils,  intellectually  and 
morally,  and  adapt  our  requirements  to  these  condi- 
tions. Detailed  questions  as  to  what  specific  subjects 
we  shall  require  must  be  subordinated  to  this  general 
principle   of  requiring   those   things,    and   only   those 

219 


THE  EDUCATION  OF   THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

things,  which  the  schools  can  do  well.  To  know 
whether  we  can  substitute  French  or  German  for 
Greek,  we  must  know  whether  any  considerable  num- 
ber of  schools  teach  French  or  German  in  such  a  way 
as  to  make  it  a  real  equivalent  for  Greek  in  the  way 
of  preparation  for  more  advanced  studies.  Unless  we 
keep  our  minds  on  this  principle,  we  shall  be  in  per- 
petual danger  of  receiving  students  who  have  been 
crammed  for  their  examinations  rather  than  trained  for 
their  work. 

The  second  of  our  leading  problems  is  the  question 
of  college  expenses.  Though  the  increase  in  this  re- 
spect is  less  than  is  popularly  supposed,  there  is  no 
doubt  that  it  is  large  enough  to  constitute  a  serious 
danger.  It  is  far  from  easy  to  see  how  this  danger  is 
to  be  avoided.  It  is  all  very  well  to  talk  of  returning 
to  the  Spartan  simplicity  of  ancient  times,  but  we  can- 
not do  it,  nor  ought  we  to  if  we  could.  We  cannot, 
for  the  sake  of  saving  the  cost  of  a  bathroom,  return  to 
the  time  when  people  took  no  baths.  Nor  can  we  meet 
the  difficulty  by  furnishing  the  comforts  of  modern 
civilization  and  charging  no  price  for  them.  If  the 
university  could  afford  to  do  it  for  every  one,  it  might 
be  well ;  but  to  do  it  for  some  and  not  for  others  works 
against  the  spirit  of  democracy.  It  may  readily  become 
a  form  of  pauperization.  This  same  danger  lurks  in 
the  whole  system  of  beneficiary  aid,  as  at  present  given 
in  Yale  and  in  most  other  colleges.  To  avoid  this 
danger,  and  at  the  same  time  give  the  men  the  help 
which  they  fairly  ought  to  have,  we  need  not  so  much 
an  increase  of  beneficiary  funds  as  an  increase  of  the 
opportunities  for  students  to  earn  their  living.  Aid  in 
education,  if  given  without  exacting  a  corresponding 
return,  becomes  demoralizing.     If  it  is  earned  by  the 

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YALE  PROBLEMS,  PAST  AND  PRESENT 

student  as  he  goes,  it  has  just  the  opposite  effect.  This 
holds  good  of  graduate  scholarships  and  fellowships  no 
less  than  of  undergraduate  ones.  There  is  no  doubt 
that  in  the  somewhat  indiscriminate  competition  of  dif- 
ferent universities  anxious  to  increase  the  size,  real  or 
apparent,  of  their  graduate  departments,  there  has  been 
an  abuse  of  these  appliances  which,  unless  promptly- 
corrected,  threatens  the  future  of  the  teaching  profes- 
sion with  an  over-abundant  influx  of  inferior  men. 

The  true  policy  in  the  matter  of  expenses  and  bene- 
ficiary aid  would  appear  to  be  as  follows  :  — 

In  building  our  new  dormitories  and  other  appliances 
connected  with  the  daily  life  of  the  students,  we  should 
strive  to  use  the  kind  of  intelligent  economy  which  any 
but  the  richest  man  would  use  in  building  a  house  for 
himself.  We  should  construct  them  on  the  standard 
set  by  our  homes  rather  than  by  our  clubs.  In  this  way 
we  should  create  a  general  level  of  average  expense  in 
the  college  life  which  would  attract  rather  than  repel  the 
boy  who  has  to  make  his  own  way.  We  should  indeed 
welcome  beautiful  buildings,  given  to  the  university  as 
memorials  of  affection;  but  we  should  strive  to  have 
them  so  designed  that  their  beauty  may  be  a  means  of 
enjoyment  to  the  whole  community. 

Tuition  should  be  remitted  with  the  utmost  free- 
dom to  all  those  who  maintain  a  respectable  standing. 
Such  tuition  should  be  either  earned  by  service  or  re- 
garded as  a  loan,  —  a  loan  without  interest,  if  you  please, 
or  at  any  rate  at  a  purely  nominal  interest  charge,  and 
payable  at  the  option  of  the  holder,  but  in  its  essence  a 
loan,  —  a  thing  to  be  paid  ultimately,  unless  disease  or 
death  intervene.  By  establishing  a  system  of  such  re- 
payment we  could  give  aid  far  more  universally  than  we 
now  do,  could  perhaps  lower  the  tuition  fees  in  general, 

221 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

and  could  avoid  a  system  of  fraud  which  is  at  present 
practised  somewhat  extensively  on  our  colleges. 

Every  scholarship  in  excess  of  the  tuition  fees, 
whether  for  undergraduates  or  for  graduates,  should  he 
distinctly  in  the  nature  of  a  prize  for  really  distinguished 
work,  or  a  payment  for  services  rendered.  I  am  aware 
that  there  are  great  practical  obstacles  which  oppose  the 
carrying  out  of  this  view,  and  I  do  not  feel  sure  how 
quickly  Yale  will  be  in  a  position  to  put  it  into  effect ; 
but  that  it  is  a  desirable  ideal  and  goal  there  appears  to 
be  no  doubt  whatever.  Remuneration  rather  than  pau- 
perization should  be  the  principle  underlying  such  aid. 

Above  all  things  —  and  this  is  a  matter  in  which 
we  need  the  co-operation  of  persons  outside  as  well  as 
inside  the  university  —  the  utmost  study  should  be  be- 
stowed on  the  possibility  of  utilizing  the  powers  of  the 
students  in  such  a  way  that  they  can  be  of  service  to  the 
college  community  and  the  world  at  large,  and  thus  earn 
the  aid  which  is  given  them.  The  problem  is  a  most 
difficult  one ;  too  difficult  even  to  be  analyzed  in  the 
brief  space  here  available.  But  the  amount  of  pro- 
gress made  already,  in  the  few  experiments  which  have 
been  seriously  tried,  leads  me  to  believe  in  an  almost 
unbounded  opportunity  for  ultimate  development  of  this 
idea. 

Our  third  group  of  problems  is  connected  with  the  de- 
velopment and  preservation  of  common  student  interests 
and  student  life  outside  of  the  immediate  work  of  the 
classroom. 

Of  all  these  interests,  the  most  fundamental  are 
those  connected  with  religious  observances  and  reli- 
gious feeling.  Yale  is,  and  has  been  from  the  first, 
a  Christian  college.  All  her  institutions  show  tliis 
throughout  their  structure.     This   was   the   dominant 

222 


rALE  PROBLEMS,  PAST  AND  PRESENT 

purpose  in  Yale's  foundation ;  and  the  work  and 
thought  of  the  children  have  conformed  to  the  wish 
of  the  fathers.  What  changes  time  may  bring  in  the 
outward  observances,  or  how  soon  it  may  bring  them,  I 
know  not.  The  question  of  compulsory  attendance  on 
religious  exercises  is  one  which  is  seriously  discussed 
by  the  faculty,  the  students,  and  the  graduates  ;  nor 
can  we  predict  the  outcome  of  such  discussion.  But 
this  I  know :  that  it  is  approached  by  all,  young  as  well 
as  old,  in  a  spirit  of  wise  conservatism  and  reverence 
for  past  usage,  and  that  no  change  will  be  made  unless 
it  shall  surely  and  clearly  appear  to  those  in  authority 
that  we  are  but  modifying  the  letter  of  a  tradition  for 
the  sake  of  preserving  its  spirit. 

Even  in  matters  of  far  less  fundamental  importance 
we  may,  I  think,  wisely  preserve  this  same  spirit  of 
conservatism.  An  ancient  university  has  a  great  ad- 
vantage in  the  existence  of  a  body  of  time-honored 
usages  and  traditions.  Some  of  these  it  inevitably 
outgrows  as  time  goes  on.  But  a  large  majority  serve 
a  most  useful  purpose  in  binding  the  students  together 
by  bonds  none  the  less  real  because  so  intangible. 
Such  college  customs  and  traditions  we  should  main- 
tain to  the  utmost.  Even  where  they  seem  artificial  or 
meaningless  we  should  be  careful  how  we  let  them  go. 
It  is  not  inconsistent  with  the  spirit  of  progress  to  value 
them  highly.  Edmund  Burke  was  one  of  the  most 
liberal  and  progressive  men  of  his  century  ;  yet  Burke 
was  the  man  who  set  the  truest  value  on  those  forms  of 
the  English  constitution  which,  as  he  himself  avowed, 
were  rooted  in  prejudice.  The  constitution  of  Yale 
to-day,  with  its  strange  combination  of  liberty  and  priv- 
ilege, of  prescriptive  custom  and  progressive  individ- 
ualism, has  not  a  few  points  of  resemblance  to  Burke's 

223 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

England.  I  can  avow  myself  a  conservative  in  the 
sense  that  Burke  was  a  conservative ;  with  him,  I 
should  hesitate  to  cast  away  the  coat  of  prejudice  and 
leave  nothing  but  the  naked  reason. 

Another  group  of  cohesive  forces  which  strengthens 
the  influence  of  a  university  upon  its  members  is  con- 
nected with  college  athletics.  The  value  of  athletic 
sports  when  practised  in  the  right  spirit  is  only  equalled 
by  their  perniciousness  when  practised  in  the  wrong 
spirit.  They  deserve  cordial  and  enthusiastic  support. 
The  time  or  thought  spent  upon  them,  great  as  it  may 
seem,  is  justified  by  their  educational  influence.  But 
side  by  side  with  this  support  and  part  of  it,  we  must 
have  unsparing  condemnation  of  the  whole  spirit  of 
professionalism.  I  do  not  refer  to  those  grosser  and 
more  obvious  forms  of  professionalism  which  college 
sentiment  has  already  learned  to  condemn.  Nor  do  I 
chiefly  refer  to  the  betting  by  which  intercollegiate  con- 
tests are  accompanied,  though  this  is  a  real  and  great 
evil,  and  does  much  to  bring  other  evils  in  its  train.  I 
refer  to  something  far  more  widespread,  which  still 
remains  a  menace  to  American  college  athletics,  —  the 
whole  system  of  regarding  athletic  achievement  as  a 
sort  of  advertisement  of  one's  prowess,  and  of  valuing 
success  for  its  own  sake  rather  than  for  the  sake  of  the 
honor  which  comes  in  achieving  it  by  honorable  methods. 
I  rejoice  in  Yale's  victories,  I  mourn  in  her  defeats ;  but 
I  mourn  still  more  whenever  I  see  a  Yale  man  who 
regards  athletics  as  a  sort  of  competitive  means  for 
pushing  the  university  ahead  of  some  rival.  This  is 
professionalism  of  the  most  subtle  and  therefore  most 
dangerous  sort.  I  know  that  the  condition  of  athletic 
discipline  in  a  college  makes  a  difference  in  its  attrac- 
tiveness to  a  large  and  desirable  class  of  young  men, 

224 


YALE  PROBLEMS,  PAST  AND  PRESENT 

and  rightly  so.  Whether  a  victory  or  a  series  of  vic- 
tories makes  such  a  difference,  and  increases  the  num- 
bers that  attend  the  university,  I  do  not  know  and  I  do 
not  care  to  know.  The  man  who  allows  his  mind  to 
dwell  on  such  a  question,  if  he  is  not  tempted  to  violate 
the  ethics  of  amateur  sport,  is  at  any  rate  playing  with 
temptation  in  a  dangerous  and  reprehensible  way,  I 
am  glad  to  believe  that  our  colleges,  and  our  nation  as 
a  whole,  are  becoming  better  able  to  understand  the 
love  of  sport  for  its  own  sake.  The  growth  of  this 
spirit  through  three  generations  has  relieved  English 
universities  of  some  of  the  problems  which  to-day  con- 
front us  in  America.  To  the  growth  of  this  spirit  we 
must  ourselves  trust  for  their  solution  here.  I  am 
ready  heartily  to  co-operate  in  any  attempts  that  other 
colleges  may  make  to  lay  down  clear  rules  for  the  prac- 
tice of  intercollegiate  athletics,  because  the  absence  of 
such  co-operation  would  be  misunderstood  and  would 
give  cause  for  suspicion  where  none  ought  to  exist. 
But  I  cannot  conceal  the  fact  that  the  majority  of  such 
rules  can  only  touch  the  surface  of  the  difficulty ;  and 
that  so  far  as  they  distract  attention  from  the  moral  ele- 
ment in  the  case  which  is  beyond  all  reach  of  rules, 
they  may  prove  a  positive  hindrance  to  progress.  If  we 
can  enter  into  athletics  for  the  love  of  honor,  in  the 
broadest  sense  of  the  word,  unmixed  with  the  love  of 
gain  in  any  sense,  we  may  now  and  then  lose  a  few 
students,  but  we  shall  grow  better  year  after  year  in  all 
that  makes  for  sound  university  life. 

Last  in  order  of  discussion,  though  perhaps  first  in 
the  imminence  with  which  they  press  upon  us  for  solu- 
tion, are  some  of  the  problems  of  university  organiza- 
tion, on  whose  proper  treatment  depends  that  economy 
of  effort  and  utilization  of  financial  resources  which  is 
15  225 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

necessary  for  the  efficient  working  of  the  institution  as 
it  stands  and  for  its  growth  in  the  immediate  future. 

Yale's  organization  differs  somewhat  fundamentally 
from  that  of  most  other  American  universities.  It  is  a 
group  of  colleges  whose  property  is  held  in  the  name 
of  a  single  corporation,  but  whose  management  is,  by 
tradition  and  in  some  slight  degree  by  legal  authority, 
located  in  the  hands  of  separate  faculties.  In  this 
respect  Yale  is  not  without  points  of  resemblance  to 
Oxford  or  Cambridge.  I  shall  not  try  to  discuss 
whether  this  system  is  on  the  whole  a  good  one.  It 
is  here,  and  we  cannot  for  the  present  change  it.  Like 
all  other  systems,  it  has  its  advantages  and  its  disadvan- 
tages. The  advantages  are  those  which  are  possessed 
by  local  government  everywhere,  —  an  independence  of 
initiative;  a  loyal  spirit  among  the  members  of  the 
several  faculties  which  is  the  natural  result  of  such 
independence;  a  sort  of  natural  grouping  of  the  stu- 
dents under  which  a  common  set  of  rules  can  be  made 
for  each  department,  and  the  evils  of  too  great  freedom 
may  be  avoided.  The  independence  of  initiative  has 
manifested  itself  in  the  development  of  new  methods 
of  instruction,  like  those  of  the  Sheffield  Scientific 
School  in  the  past,  or  the  Department  of  Music  in  the 
present.  The  loyalty  has  been  exemplified  over  and 
over  again  in  the  readiness  to  work  for  salaries  even 
more  conspicuously  inadequate  than  those  which  have 
been  paid  at  other  universities,  by  men  who  seek  their 
reward  in  the  possibilities  of  future  greatness.  This 
history  of  disinterested  effort  for  future  rather  than 
present  reward  has  repeated  itself  in  each  department 
of  instruction.  The  effect  of  the  grouping  of  the  stu- 
dents in  separate  departments  has  shown  itself  in  the 
preservation  of  that  esprit  de   corps  which    Yale  has 

226 


YALE  PROBLEMS,  PAST  AND  PRESENT 

succeeded  in  maintaining,  I  believe,  to  a  greater  degree 
than  any  other  university  of  the  same  magnitude. 

On  the  other  hand  the  system  has  the  disadvantages 
which  everywhere  pertain  to  a  scheme  of  independent 
local  government.  There  is  sometimes  a  difficulty  in 
carrying  the  whole  university  sharply  forward  into  any 
definite  line  of  policy,  however  strongly  it  may  be 
demanded.  There  is  yet  more  frequently  a  lack  of  co- 
ordination in  courses ;  the  work  of  each  of  the  separate 
parts  or  schools  having  been  originally  devised  with 
reference  to  the  needs  of  members  of  that  school  rather 
than  to  those  of  the  university  as  a  whole.  And  finally, 
there  is  a  certain  amount  of  duplication  of  appliances 
which  involves  some  actual  loss  of  economy  and  makes 
the  impression  on  the  public  of  causing  even  more  loss 
than  really  exists.  Especially  severe  does  this  loss 
seem  to  some  of  the  most  zealous  members  of  the  pro- 
fessional schools,  who  believe  that  by  combining  the 
work  of  their  opening  years  with  that  of  the  later  years 
of  the  Academic  Department  or  Sheffield  Scientific 
School,  they  can  serve  the  University  and  the  cause 
of  learning  with  far  more  fulness  and  freedom  than 
at  present. 

Reform  under  these  circumstances  can  only  be  the 
result  of  unconstrained  discussion  and  intelligent  nego- 
tiation. The  best  possibilities  lie  not  in  the  exercise 
of  authority  but  of  diplomacy.  The  effort  to  impose 
a  prearranged  policy  is  likely  to  prove  futile.  We 
cannot  insist  on  an  external  appearance  of  harmony 
without  losing  more  than  we  gain.  To  say  that  the 
Scientific  School  ought  to  have  a  four  years'  course 
because  the  Academic  Department  has  one,  or  to  insist 
that  the  Academic  Department  should  withdraw  from 
the  teaching  of  natural  science  because  the  Scientific 

227 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN   CITIZEN 

School  has  made  such  full  provision  for  it,  serves  only 
to  retard  the  movement  toward  co-operation.  The 
president  who  would  succeed  in  establishing  real 
harmony  must  occupy  himself  first  with  providing 
the  means  to  lead  men  to  a  mutual  understanding, 
rather  than  with  predicting  the  results  which  should 
follow. 

Foremost  among  the  means  which  we  must  use  is  free 
and  unreserved  discussion  of  principles.  Even  within 
the  departments  such  discussion  has  been  by  no  means 
so  universal  as  it  might  have  been.  In  more  than  one 
of  them  there  has  been  a  tendency,  both  in  matters  of 
administration  and  of  educational  policy,  to  rest  con- 
tent with  a  compromise  between  conflicting  interests, 
rather  than  a  reconciliation  of  conflicting  views.  A 
typical  result  of  this  policy  has  been  seen  in  the  course 
of  study  in  the  Academic  Department,  where  for  many 
years  the  so-called  elective  system  was  really  not  a 
system  at  all,  but  the  haphazard  result  of  competition 
between  the  advocates  of  different  lines  of  instruction, 
—  a  thing  which  all  unite  in  desiring  to  reform.  With 
a  reasonable  degree  of  diplomacy  and  patience  the  task 
of  reform  in  cases  like  this  should  not  prove  a  hard 
one. 

Still  less  adequate  has  been  the  interchange  of  ideas 
between  the  different  departments.  Under  the  old  sys- 
tem the  several  faculties  have  had  no  organized  means 
of  discussing  subjects  of  common  interest,  or  even  of 
learning  one  another's  views.  The  establishment  of  a 
university  council  for  such  interchange  of  thought  is  an 
imperative  necessity.  What  will  ultimately  prove  the 
best  form  and  constitution  for  such  a  council  can  only 
be  a  matter  of  conjecture.  For  the  present,  at  any 
rate,  such   a  body  is   likely  to  be  for  the   most  part 

228 


YALE  PROBLEMS,  PAST  AND  PRESENT 

deliberative  in  its  functions.  Whatever  else  such  a 
body  may  do  or  fail  to  do  it  can  prevent  many  of  the 
misunderstandings  and  cross  purposes  which  arise  from 
imperfect  information,  and  can  thus  contribute  to  the 
successful  transaction  of  all  business  that  is  possible  by 
preventing  attempts  at  the  impossible. 

In  the  second  place,  we  must  so  use  those  funds 
which  are  at  the  disposal  of  the  central  administration 
as  to  make  it  an  object  for  men  in  the  different  depart- 
ments to  co-operate  at  those  points  where  the  absence  of 
such  co-operation  does  most  harm. 

As  far  as  elementary  teaching  is  concerned,  the  waste 
from  having  the  same  subject  taught  in  two  or  more 
departments  may  be  more  apparent  than  real.  It  in- 
volves no  very  great  loss  to  teach  elementary  chemistry 
in  two  independent  sets  of  laboratories  if  both  labora- 
tories are  always  kept  full  of  students.  The  waste 
comes  in  thus  teaching  advanced  chemistry  where  there 
are  relatively  few  students  and  where  there  is  much 
need  of  specialization.  Under  such  circumstances  the 
existence  of  separate  laboratories  tends  to  prevent 
proper  division  of  labor.  Under  such  circumstances 
duplication  is  a  waste  and  co-ordination  a  necessity.  If 
the  material  appliances  for  higher  education  are  not  the 
property  of  any  one  department,  but  stand  in  relation 
to  the  university  as  a  whole,  the  instructors  of  the 
different  departments  tend  of  their  own  free  will  to 
co-operate  with  one  another  in  the  higher  instruction 
in  their  several  branches.  Under  proper  management, 
institutions  like  the  Peabody  Museum  or  the  Win- 
chester Observatory  tend  thus  to  systematize  instruc- 
tion at  the  point  where  such  an  effect  is  most  needed. 
With  a  very  moderate  increase  of  endowment,  properly 
applied,  I  believe  that  the  same  sort  of  harmony  can  be 

229 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CITIZEN 

attained  in  many  other  lines  of  instruction.  Among 
the  achievements  of  my  predecessor  in  office  there  is 
none  so  wide -reaching  in  its  effects  as  the  development 
of  a  large  university  fund  which,  without  threatening 
the  independence  of  the  several  departments,  can  be 
used  to  provide  means  for  promoting  unity  of  action 
where  such  unity  is  indispensable. 

In  the  English  universities  the  teaching  is  in  large 
measure  done  by  the  several  colleges,  while  the  exami- 
nations are,  with  few  exceptions,  the  affair  of  the 
university.  It  seems  probable  that  the  development  of 
Yale  in  the  future  may  be  just  the  reverse  of  this ;  the 
several  colleges  taking  charge  of  the  examinations  and 
of  those  more  elementary  studies  whose  control  natu- 
rally connects  itself  with  the  control  of  examinations, 
while  the  distinctively  teaching  appliances  come,  to  a 
constantly  greater  extent,  into  the  hands  of  the  univer- 
sity authorities.  Under  such  a  system  we  should  have 
a  well-ordered  scheme  of  local  government,  where  each 
department  could  make  its  own  rules,  prescribe  the 
conditions  of  entrance  and  graduation,  and  be  subject  to 
the  minimum  of  interference  from  without;  but  where 
at  the  same  time  the  instruction  would  be  so  ordered 
that  students  whose  course  lay  under  the  control  of  one 
faculty  could  yet  enjoy  to  the  fullest  possible  extent 
the  teaching  provided  by  another,  and  where,  as  the 
subject  of  study  became  more  and  more  advanced,  the 
distinction  of  separate  faculties  or  colleges  would  dis- 
appear altogether. 

Such  are,  in  brief  outline,  a  few  of  the  problems 
which  we  have  inherited  from  the  past.  It  would  be 
indeed  a  large  burden  had  we  not  also  inherited  from 
that  past  an  inspiration  yet  larger.  Yale's  seal  bears 
the  motto,  "Light  and  Truth;"  Yale's  history  has  been 

230 


YALE  PROBLEMS,  PAST  AND  PRESENT 

worthy  of  its  signet.  Never  have  there  been  wanting 
torch-bearers  to  take  the  light  from  the  hands  that  re- 
linquished it.  In  this  place,  hallowed  by  the  deeds  of 
our  fathers,  all  words  of  formal  acceptance  of  the  duties 
which  they  have  left  us  are  meaningless.  It  is  a  God- 
given  trust:  may  God  bless  the  issue  I 


231 


UC  SOUTHERN  REGIONAL  LIBRARY  FACILITY 


A    000  605  897    8 


!  ^ 


